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Music industry swamps swap networks with phony files

http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/sil...ey/3560365.htm

Quote:

Major record labels have launched an aggressive new guerrilla assault on the underground music networks, flooding online swapping services with bogus copies of popular songs.

The online music sites know they're under attack. Darrell Smith, chief technical officer of StreamCast Networks, parent of the popular file-swapping service Morpheus, said he first noticed the practice about a year ago, but chalked it up to "rogue teenage hackers just being obnoxious.

"It's more prevalent in the last three months," he said. "It's gotten real, real, real severe."

Sources at three major labels admit they're deluging popular services like Morpheus, Kazaa and Grokster with thousands of decoy music files that look identical to a sought-after song, but are filled with long minutes of silence -- or 30-second loops of a song's chorus.

By making stealing more of a hassle, they hope to persuade more people to shell out for a CD at the local record store.

The practice is called "spoofing" and it is widespread. Over the last three months, virtually any song destined for the Billboard pop music charts has been spoofed, the sources say.

"Several of the labels are doing it with every release," said one record label executive speaking on condition of anonymity. "We're not using any of this with any kind of promotion or marketing in mind. We're doing this simply because we believe people are stealing our stuff and we want to stymie the stealing."

This "fight theft with deception" initiative is a tacit acknowledgment by the industry that legal victories are not enough to stop the wildfire popularity of online music swapping, which researcher Ipsos-Reid estimates now attracts 40 million users in the United States alone.

Taken together with the growth in sales of recordable compact discs and burners, it is fueling an epidemic of piracy that the labels blame for a 16 percent drop in global music sales.

"From the outset, it's been very clear that one of the only ways -- as a practical matter -- to deal with the peer-to-peer problem is by means of technological measures," said Cary Sherman, president of the Recording Industry Association of America, the leading trade group for the labels. "There are certainly mechanisms that are available -- that are completely lawful, such as spoofing."

Smith, from StreamCast, said the network is being flooded with bogus files -- all coming from sources that can marshal massive amounts of bandwidth and banks of computers occupying a narrow range of Internet addresses. It's clearly intended to disrupt the file-sharing network, he said.

No one expects spoofing to deter hard-core pirates, who download entire CDs or feature films from online sources that require sophisticated knowledge of file-transfer protocols or Internet Relay Chat trigger commands.

"This is putting your finger in the dike," said Bruce Forest, a noted Internet piracy expert. "This is going to slow down piracy a bit. It isn't going to stop it."

But the labels hope to discourage mainstream users from turning to popular file-swapping services rather than the local record store for their copy of Sheryl Crow's "Soak Up the Sun."

"Things got out of balance. It's too easy to find pirated music," said Josh Bernoff, an analyst for Forrester Research in Cambridge, Mass. "Now, they're moving the balance back in the other direction."

Label sources describe spoofing as only the first in a series of electronic countermeasures intended to frustrate the 18.7 million consumers who researcher comScore Media Metrix estimates turned to the digital underground last month to download bootleg copies of music, films, games and software.

Some label execs say they're evaluating other technologies that would scramble search queries or add file attachments to make a compressed music file that would typically download in less than a minute "move like molasses."

Those countermeasures could cross "into a gray area as far as legality," admits another record executive who asked not to be named. He said frustrated record label employees could resort to such measures as propagating viruses, rationalizing " `Hey, if you don't mind stealing my career and livelihood, I'm sure you don't mind if I destroy your hard drive.' "

Paving the way for more aggressive industry counterattacks, Beverly Hills congressman Howard Berman is preparing a bill that would let copyright owners, such as record labels or movie studios, launch high-tech attacks against file-swapping networks where their wares are traded.

Berman said that copyright owners need new legal protections to combat online piracy. Some of the labels' and studios' high-tech tricks for stopping online file traders might be illegal under current anti- hacking laws.

It's impossible to know whether these electronic countermeasures exist now or whether the labels are engaging in a bit of bravado, hoping to scare away would-be file-swappers.

The leading vendors specializing in piracy detection -- Overpeer, Vidius, NetPD, Media Defender and MediaForce -- fall mute when it comes to revealing the names of their media clients or the nature of their work.

In the spy-vs.-spy world that has become online piracy, online swapping sites are fighting back. The next version of Morpheus' software, due out in three months, will contain its own countermeasures in an attempt to foil the spoofers, StreamCast Network's Smith said.

It will incorporate a rating mechanism that allows users to identify fake files and a method of certifying users as legitimate users.

"Without any checks and balances in place the individuals who are spoofing can create all types of havoc on files," said Smith.

Precisely what the labels had in mind.

Lets take this apart, legally that is.
"flooded with bogus files -- all coming from sources that can marshal massive amounts of bandwidth and banks of computers occupying a narrow range of Internet addresses"
Would it be legal to set up a web site that tracks users reported to be sharing "bogus" files, like those people who record their own band's song but name it something popular?

"they're evaluating other technologies that would scramble search queries"
Now we know where those queries are coming from, see above for bogus IPs. Aren't they disrupting a computer network? Isn't that illegal under THEIR current law? DMCA?
Should we start logging this activity?

"Those countermeasures could cross 'into a gray area as far as legality,' admits another record executive"
Gray? Isn't sharing for NO PROFIT gray? Wasn't copyright created for people making a PROFIT from selling bogus CDs? They used to say the damage was "customers get a low quality product"?

"add file attachments to make a compressed music file" - larger than a cow.
No one would be that stupid.

If you do get a "bogus" MP3 directly from one of those known record company IPs, then can't you consider that their official SAMPLE PRODUCT that they are giving away and thus THEIR SAMPLE PRODUCT SUCKS (and the band that is named is then damaged)?
Could someone legally spread that sample file all over to help those poor, hungry record companies with their public relations? They need our help guys, come on, help out would ya?

"electronic countermeasures intended to frustrate the 18.7 million consumers"
Frustrate your customers, current or future, now there's a smart new marketing concept.

"It's clearly intended to disrupt the file-sharing network"
Let's re-word that to DAMAGE the network and those who are using it, and thus it's illegal, plain and simple, with or without DCMA or "congress approval". Damage is common law and we never gave the government authority to license people to damage other people.

"Some label execs say they're evaluating other technologies"
Hey, before I call my lawyer, I have a technology for them that's easy to do:
They should LOWER THEIR PRICE so low no one will want to bother with sharing networks. Never mind, too simple.

Anyone at the EFF ready to take on this case?

Quote:

Originally posted by Unregistered

Would it be legal to set up a web site that tracks users reported to be sharing "bogus" files, like those people who record their own band's song but name it something popular?

It would be legal, but you'd have to be careful. For example, if it was the FBI out there harvesting IP addresses of people illegally distributing copyrighted materials and you set up a site listing the IP addresses they were at telling people to block them, it could come back on you as obstruction of justice charges. (****... how exactly did I word those posts again...)

Quote:

Originally posted by Unregistered
"they're evaluating other technologies that would scramble search queries"
Now we know where those queries are coming from, see above for bogus IPs. Aren't they disrupting a computer network? Isn't that illegal under THEIR current law? DMCA?
Should we start logging this activity?

They're working on ways around this too. Read the article at http://news.com.com/2100-1023-939333.html?tag=fd_top and visit the thread about it at http://www.gnutellaforums.com/showth...threadid=12864

Quote:

Originally posted by Unregistered
"Those countermeasures could cross 'into a gray area as far as legality,' admits another record executive"
Gray? Isn't sharing for NO PROFIT gray? Wasn't copyright created for people making a PROFIT from selling bogus CDs? They used to say the damage was "customers get a low quality product"?

Quote:

Originally posted by Unregistered

"electronic countermeasures intended to frustrate the 18.7 million consumers"
Frustrate your customers, current or future, now there's a smart new marketing concept.

Somehow this will continue to elude them, I'm sure of it.

Quote:

Originally posted by Unregistered

"It's clearly intended to disrupt the file-sharing network"
Let's re-word that to DAMAGE the network and those who are using it, and thus it's illegal, plain and simple, with or without DCMA or "congress approval". Damage is common law and we never gave the government authority to license people to damage other people.

Well, if they get the-powers-that-be to see p2p networks as just another fencing operation then the damage will rain. Ever see what cops do to a house when they serve a search warrenty? It's all kinds of damage.

Quote:

Originally posted by Unregistered
I have a technology for them that's easy to do:
They should LOWER THEIR PRICE so low no one will want to bother with sharing networks. Never mind, too simple.

This will continue to elude them as well.

Quote:

" `Hey, if you don't mind stealing my career and livelihood, I'm sure you don't mind if I destroy your hard drive.' "

That reminds me of the movie Pulp Fiction. See Vincent as P2P users, Jules as the one that mentioned the above; where the pig is a P2P network and the dog is a rouge MP3 download Website:

Vincent: "You want some bacon?"

Jules: "No, man, I don't eat pork."

- "Are you Jewish"

+ "No, I ain't Jewish, i just don't dig on swine, that's all."

- "Why not?"

+ "Pigs are filthy animals. I don't eat filthy animals."

- "But bacon tastes good, pork chops taste good..."

+ "Hey, sewer rat may taste like pumpkin pie, but I'd never know 'cause I wouldn't eat the filthy motherf**kers. Pigs sleep and root in sh*t, that's a filthy animal. I don't eat nothin' that ain't got sense enough to disregard its own feces."

- "How about a dog? A dog eats its own feces"

+ "I don't eat dog either"

- "Yeah, but do you consider a dog to be a filthy animal?"

+ "I wouldn't go so far as to call a dog filthy, but it's definately dirty. But, dogs got personality, personality goes a long way."

- "So by that rationale, if a pig had a better personality, he would cease to be a filty animal. Is that true?"

+ "We' have to be talkin' 'bout one charmin' motherf**kin' pig. I mean he'd have to be ten times more charmin' than that Arnold on Green Acres, you know what I'm sayin'?"

Wow Mike,
Did you quote that on the fly? :eek:

That particular Pulp Fiction dialogue is on the soundtrack, so I guess a lot of people know it by heart. I have the DVD (gasp! I actually bought it!) and the screenplay and there was one stage after watching the film about 30 times when I could have recited 98% of the script.

But back to the subject at hand....Does anybody remember the class in business school where they tell you that the best way to run a company is to declare all out war on your customers? No, I don't either. But that's what the recording industry is doing. Shooting itself in the foot, slowly but surely, a bullet through each toe.

A pattern has been established: Napster arrived on the scene and was shut down. Users moved to Fastrack and Audiogalaxy , which in turn have been subjected to legal action. Gnutella has inherited much of this user base and is now under attack. If the authorities do manage to topple Gnutella, I have no doubt whatsoever that an alternative will be up an running within weeks or months.

As the birth of Gnutella demonstrated, a new protocol can be established very quickly if developers are mobilised and these tactics by the MPAA and RIAA in conjunction with the recording industry will provoke exactly that - a large scale mobilisation of P2P developers spurred on by irritated users. It's a natural law, that when one source ceases to deliver, people will look for another; and where there's demand there will be a supply.

Think of the situation in almost any large town or city in the world, where there is always at least one neighbourhood occupied by drug dealers. At some point, the police will do a series of raids and on rare occasions will succeed in cleaning up the area, at which time the dealers will shift to another zone and continue business as usual with 0 effect on the local drug market. Why? Because the authorities have not tackled the root of the problem.

In the case of music piracy, the root problem is simple: Overpricing.

For the studio I work in, we often make a 1000 copies (professionally printed with full colour inlays) of the CDs we record for around $1000 and we then sell them for $5-6 (at least 400% profit). In Europe, new-release commercial CDs cost $17-20. This price, even taking into account national / international distribution, promotion and intermediaries is excessive, to say the least.

They found them :D

To any RIAA, MPAA, Sony, EMI etc. scouts who may be watching this forum, I'd like you to pass on my sincere thanks to your bosses.

"Has he gone mad?" I hear you cry.

Well, no. I've been reading news and reactions about 'The Industry's' anti-file-sharing campaign over the last few days and it seems they've managed to turn everyone against them (did hey have many supporters beforehand?) - which, with people as generally open-minded and patient as the music fraternity, is an admirable feat (I don't include flatliner CD consumers brainwashed by carpet-bomb marketing in this group).

In a short time, they seem to have mobilised a large number of developers who have vowed to unite and produce more efficient clients/protocols with much improved security features - such as untraceable hosts. The advance of P2P technology will accelerate drastically and the anti-big-label boycotts of disgruntled music******rs will increase the number of P2P users as recent publicity may already have done to a certain extent.

As for the attacks themselves - I don't listen to Britney, N-Sync or any of their clones so it doesn't affect me, and their fans are the ones that have been brainwashed into buying the CDs anyway.

So thankyou RIAA for digging your own grave and giving such a big boost to P2P development! :D

Regarding the Eminem Loop files:

In this months Yahoo Internet Life (August 2002), the Inbrief column (page 13), there's a small notion about Eminem:

"Eminem Gets Burned. Weeks before the official release in stores of Eminem's new album, The Eminem Show, Net bootlegs were so prevalent that the disc was the week's second most played CD (on PCs) in the world, according to the charts on Gracenote [gracenote.com]. It went on to hit No. 1 on retail charts, too ..."

So first, how can an unreleased album appear on the Internet, if there's no "inside cooperation" going on at one of the companies involved? Second, the album and song hit No. 1 on the charts - could that be attributed to the fact people have been able to listen to the songs before, or simply because most of the CD buyers like Eminem? Given the discussions some "reputed" columnists had about Eminem, the later seems not to apply in full.

Nonetheless, does that mean I condone bootlegs? No, not if you're going to keep the bootlegged version and don't buy the retail version. But that's just a personal opinion which may not agree with someone elses (so let's leave that out if anyone decides to reply)

Ah, yes! This is another of the great recording industry tricks. Ever been amazed at how a new release by a big artist has gone straight in at number 1 in the charts?

"Gosh, people must really have flocked to the record store on the first day!", you may think.

Well yes, but no. the big labels often buy up a couple of million copies of their own records before the official release so that they start well in the charts. At the top level it's assumed as part of the promotion costs. Sad but true!