IPretorian Blog, Internet Privacy Protector

.. is whatever they can sell, ever voilating own privacy policy . And FB is not alone: check Wall Street Journal story.

Facebook privacy policy has.. 5830 words(!), US Constitution – only 4400 words, counted by “The New York Times“. Facebook Privacy settings looks something like this: LOL.

Mark Zuckerberg posted an open letter in “The Washington Post” answering privacy concerns: “We do not give advertisers access to your personal information”. LOL again. But hey, what to expect from this all-knowing guy: “I know that people don’t want privacy“.

Six months after harsh HADOPI law – adoption of the three-strikes anti-piracy legislation was introduced in France, online piracy has increased significantly. A new study published by the University of Rennes shows that the critics are indeed right. The researchers looked into the habits of downloaders before and after the law was implemented. They found that instead of reducing piracy levels, the piracy rate actually went up by 3%. People just switched to other file-sharing services, not covered by Hadopi. Another blunder  of politicians making law about thing they lack basic understanding. We can only concur with TorrentFreak: “The answer to the increasing piracy rates worldwide is not legislation. Instead, the entertainment industry may accomplish much more by innovating and expanding their online business so that it meets the demands of today’s digital consumers.”

In Spain music group SGAE (Sociedad General de Autores y Editores) lost in court of law case against Donkey link site elrincondejesus.com: judge Raul N. García Orejudo declared that both non-commercial file-sharing link sites and non-profit use of P2P networks are legal in Spain. “P2P networks are mere conduits for the transmission of data between Internet users, and on this basis they do not infringe rights protected by Intellectual Property laws,” he declared. Therefore, if an individual uses P2P networks like eDonkey or BitTorrent to obtain copyright material for non-profit reasons, the act is completely legal. Outcome of taking this case to cours is nothing short of a disaster for SGAE.

In Lithuania anti-piracy outfit LANVA has lost its case against a user of the prominent BitTorrent tracker LinkoManija.net. Self-proclaimed investigators evidence consisted of a screenshot of peers as listed by uTorrent. The evidence was gathered in conjunction with a local police officer, but none of the parties involved was authorized to conduct an investigation of this kind. Citing faulty evidence judge closed the case and stated that LANVA had no right to collect and use the information they gathered. In addition, the judge ruled that such evidence gathering techniques have to be approved before they can be used.

Bottom line, a question to ‘copyright defenders’: end justifies the means?