3 ms·

Is this legal? I’m of the impression that publishing infohashes to copyrighted content is illegal under DMCA?

pessimizer 1y ago
The site doesn't publish any, except the two legal torrents that are on the front page. Any others you have to either request specifically, or are simply randomly generated.
freetonik 1y ago
Assuming the web server does not actually store and serve pages in a conventional sense, but rather acts like an application that can render the results of parsing and processing user's input, I wonder what are legal implications. I can generate a Google link with an infohash in the same fashion: https://www.google.com/search?q=1548262051907755713575797913521592584027261648&oq=1548262051907755713575797913521592584027261648 https://www.google.com/search?q=1548262051907755713575797913...
- extraduder_ire 1y ago
  A few years ago, google stopped returning good links for strings that looked like bittorrent infohashes. Prior to that, it was actually a useful way to find information on and potentially trackers for an infohash you had Yandex is the only search engine that's even marginal useful for that now.
reorder9695 1y ago
I wonder how hosting a torrent is different to google showing a link to a pirated movie, both are just holding data that tells you where to find the content, not the content itself
- akimbostrawman 1y ago
  neither "hosts" the content. they both just point to the destination with the content.
- throwaway894345 1y ago
  I think Google is expected to abide DMCA takedowns in such cases, but IANAL. My understanding is that even an indirect reference (such as a link or infohash) is a DMCA violation.
  - extraduder_ire 1y ago
    They happily link to a prime number that will decrypt DVDs in blatant disregard for the DMCA, however. I don't believe they received a takedown request for this one. https://www.theregister.com/2001/09/11/worlds_first_decss_executable_prime/ https://www.theregister.com/2001/09/11/worlds_first_decss_ex...
- weberer 1y ago
  That was The Pirate Bay's defense and... they're still around.
lxgr 1y ago
It's probably as illegal as any other random number generator.
akimbostrawman 1y ago
it is. same as with URLs the infringement is the actual copyrighted content not the pointing to it.
ratelimitsteve 1y ago
the infohash isn't copyrighted, so it's not illegal information in and of itself. serving the infohash isn't serving the torrent, and serving the torrent is also not serving copyrighted material. I believe that downloading is still illegal absent a fair use exemption but it's rarely prosecuted because you have to prove the absence of the exemption. It's uploading copyrighted content that's actually illegal and also easy to prosecute, so it's seeders that usually get bopped.
- throwaway894345 1y ago
  > the infohash isn't copyrighted, so it's not illegal information in and of itself. serving the infohash isn't serving the torrent, and serving the torrent is also not serving copyrighted material I'm of the impression that serving either the infohash or the torrent is considered to violate DMCA. DMCA does not just forbid sharing copyrighted material, but also sharing links to the copyrighted material or generally anything that can help people bypass copyright protections (including software that can decrypt even trivial DRM).
  - ratelimitsteve 1y ago
    if serving the infohash was a DMCA violation copyright holders would be thrilled to tear down every torrent site in existence. You can't link to the material, but the infohash isn't that either. It's conceptually a link to the torrent. You're partially right about DRM though. Software to directly circumvent copy protections is illegal under DMCA. But talking about the process is still not illegal, and that has led to some really clever workarounds like the DeCSS Haiku (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS_haiku https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS_haiku)

The site doesn't publish any, except the two legal torrents that are on the front page. Any others you have to either request specifically, or are simply randomly generated.

freetonik 1y ago

Assuming the web server does not actually store and serve pages in a conventional sense, but rather acts like an application that can render the results of parsing and processing user's input, I wonder what are legal implications. I can generate a Google link with an infohash in the same fashion: https://www.google.com/search?q=1548262051907755713575797913521592584027261648&oq=1548262051907755713575797913521592584027261648 https://www.google.com/search?q=1548262051907755713575797913...

extraduder_ire 1y ago
A few years ago, google stopped returning good links for strings that looked like bittorrent infohashes. Prior to that, it was actually a useful way to find information on and potentially trackers for an infohash you had Yandex is the only search engine that's even marginal useful for that now.

reorder9695 1y ago

I wonder how hosting a torrent is different to google showing a link to a pirated movie, both are just holding data that tells you where to find the content, not the content itself

akimbostrawman 1y ago
neither "hosts" the content. they both just point to the destination with the content.
throwaway894345 1y ago
I think Google is expected to abide DMCA takedowns in such cases, but IANAL. My understanding is that even an indirect reference (such as a link or infohash) is a DMCA violation.
- extraduder_ire 1y ago
  They happily link to a prime number that will decrypt DVDs in blatant disregard for the DMCA, however. I don't believe they received a takedown request for this one. https://www.theregister.com/2001/09/11/worlds_first_decss_executable_prime/ https://www.theregister.com/2001/09/11/worlds_first_decss_ex...
weberer 1y ago
That was The Pirate Bay's defense and... they're still around.

lxgr 1y ago

It's probably as illegal as any other random number generator.

akimbostrawman 1y ago

it is. same as with URLs the infringement is the actual copyrighted content not the pointing to it.

ratelimitsteve 1y ago

the infohash isn't copyrighted, so it's not illegal information in and of itself. serving the infohash isn't serving the torrent, and serving the torrent is also not serving copyrighted material. I believe that downloading is still illegal absent a fair use exemption but it's rarely prosecuted because you have to prove the absence of the exemption. It's uploading copyrighted content that's actually illegal and also easy to prosecute, so it's seeders that usually get bopped.

throwaway894345 1y ago
> the infohash isn't copyrighted, so it's not illegal information in and of itself. serving the infohash isn't serving the torrent, and serving the torrent is also not serving copyrighted material I'm of the impression that serving either the infohash or the torrent is considered to violate DMCA. DMCA does not just forbid sharing copyrighted material, but also sharing links to the copyrighted material or generally anything that can help people bypass copyright protections (including software that can decrypt even trivial DRM).
- ratelimitsteve 1y ago
  if serving the infohash was a DMCA violation copyright holders would be thrilled to tear down every torrent site in existence. You can't link to the material, but the infohash isn't that either. It's conceptually a link to the torrent. You're partially right about DRM though. Software to directly circumvent copy protections is illegal under DMCA. But talking about the process is still not illegal, and that has led to some really clever workarounds like the DeCSS Haiku (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS_haiku https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS_haiku)