TorrentSpy ordered to be a Stooge
Torrent Freak and CNet are reporting that torrentspy has been ordered to start tracking their users, and what they do on their web site. Besides being a devastating blow to the users of torrentspy, this means that to comply with the court order, they essentially become an enforcement wing of copyright holders. This is an interesting precedent setting case, asking the question of does a public commercial web site have to start tracking users, and turn that information over to a 3rd party with a vested interest.
Honestly, we have a vested interest in how well other tech blogs are doing, really doing, and the only way to really get that kind of info is to get our hands on their logs. So if we claim that they somehow are violating our copyright (maybe we can copyright the concept of a technical blog) and ask a court to get the same data for us? That probably would not fly, but this is exactly what the court ordered torrentspy to do.
A court decision reached last month but under seal until Friday could force Web sites to track visitors if the sites become defendants in a lawsuit. Source: CNet
Log files are both competitive intelligence, and damming when used in or out of context depending on what people are doing on the internet. The AOL log file release and the popularity of AOL Stalker shows that this is a wealth of information about people that can be tracked back to the original user.
While we recommend using a proxy system to contact torrentspy in the future, that way it does not show your IP address, there are hundreds of other sites out there. By trying to pick off the top sites, eventually people will use other sites and when they become top sites, the process keeps on happening. Really it seems that once you get to a certain popularity, you are going to be a target, it is the smaller ones with some content rather than the bigger dump sites that are going to see the biggest increase in users.
Just make sure you do not have to log in or provide any personal details when using a smaller site. And still use a proxy system to access those sites. Proxies should be popular in the future to keep people from finding out who you are, or what you are doing as a physical IP address.
It will be interesting to keep on following the torrentspy saga, they have until 12 June to file their appeal, lets hope that they do so.
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