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November 27, 2010

The U.S. government has shut down several sites apparently suspected of either linking to or providing access to copyrighted materials.

Visitors to TorrentFreak publishing a list of sites that had been taken down.

If that list is accurate, only a few apparently disseminated links to BitTorrent trackers, the master index for distributing a given file across the Internet through the BitTorrent network. Such sites included Torrent-Finder.com, but also mydreamwatches.com and nfljerseysupply.com, among others. Others apparently distributed music.

"ICE office of Homeland Security Investigations executed court-ordered seizure warrants against a number of domain names," ICE said in a written statement to the UPI. "As this is an ongoing investigation, there are no additional details available at this time."

The move appears to be completely independent of COICA, the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act making its way through the U.S. Senate.

The bill - which would need to survive a full vote in the Senate, the House, and be signed into law by President Obama - would authorize the Department of Justice to file an in rem civil action against a domain name, and seek a preliminary order from the court that the domain name is being used to traffic infringing material. (The term in rem refers to a suit against a thing - in this case, a domain - rather than a specific individual or individuals.)

According to the COICA bill, a domestic registrar would be required to suspend the site's domain once the order was received.

Sites outside the United States would essentially be placed on a blacklist, and U.S. ISPs would be required to block them.

On Nov. 18, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved the bill. The next step is a vote in the full Senate.

Numerous scam sites abound on the Web, and sites like ResellerRatings.com were formed to help customers vet the legitimacy of online shopping sites, especially around the holidays.

Fortunately, the "Italian Job" Web sites that cropped up in 2007 appear to have diminished; those sites required a user to wire a Western Union money order to an overseas address.

http://www.pcmag.com/arti...488,00.asp

I read this last night . . .

Did anyone notice the goverment could seize sites being accused of copyright infringement? Due process any one? When you give the state powers that eclipse rights under the guise of "homeland security" the powers that be will surely abuse those powers.