Arts groups tell BT to block access to The Pirate Bay
 

UK arts lobby groups have demanded BT block access to the BitTorrent file sharing website, The Pirate Bay.

Music industry trade body, the BPI, said it would take legal action if the telecoms firm refused to co-operate.

The movie industry has already forced BT to block Newzbin 2, a members-only which aggregates illegally copied material.

BT said: "We can confirm we are now in receipt of a letter from the BPI. BT is considering its response."

The telecoms operator added that a court order would be needed before any blocking could begin.

A source told the BBC the firm was unlikely to fight a lengthy legal battle as it had in the Newzbin case.

"We would not tolerate Counterfeits 'R' Us on the High Street - if we want economic growth, we cannot accept illegal rip-off sites on the internet either," said the BPI's chief executive, Geoff Taylor.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15598438

Unfortunatly blocking sites does not work

Newzbin claims BT block 'not working'

BT has started blocking access to the controversial website Newzbin 2.

But the group behind the site claims that its users are still able to access it via a workaround that it issued in September.

Newzbin 2 is a members-only site which aggregates a large amount of the illegally copied material found on Usenet discussion forums.

Last month the movie industry won the right to impose blocks via BT.

BT told the BBC that the block had come into force on 2 November.

It is implementing the blocks by tweaking software developed to prevent users from finding websites showing images of child abuse.

"Newzbin have offered their customers a client for over a month that they claim will bypass Cleanfeed. However we're not in a position to comment on whether that claim is true or not," said a spokesman.

The group behind Newzbin 2 commented: "We've heard that the British Telecom censorship of the free web has begun."

It told the BBC that 93.5% of its active UK users have downloaded the workaround software.

It is not willing to reveal how the code attempts to get around the Cleanfeed block.

However, tests run by website TorrentFreak found that the program relies on encryption to hide communication between users and Newzbin2.

Another technique it uses is to route all traffic through a well-established system known as TOR, which masks the identity of users and what they are trying to look at.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15572495

Everybody who uses it is just going to jump ship to a different ISP.

Look how effective the Newzbin block was, they're giving away a VPN so people can access the site anyway.

Yep

BT did fight the Newzbin ban in court but said they wont fight against blocking the Pirate Bay. They know that people just use a work around or as you say just move ISPs So whats the point of trying to fight it and loose a shit load more money. Its kinda pointless or they just use stuff like this below which makes it even harder to trace peoples IPs

"Another technique it uses is to route all traffic through a well-established system known as TOR, which masks the identity of users and what they are trying to look at."

LOL @ the claim that blocking pirated content is censorship.

:1orglaugh

you cant defeat torrents... they will pop somewhere else... same as tubes with user uploads and rapidshare link farms

I dont realy agree with that,while hardcore pirate will use vpn or any other way to bypass ban,it will work against average joe.

Yes the average Joe that downloads binaries from Usenet :thumbsup

I bet majority of internet users has no clue what is usenet.

why the focus on torrent sites. all the traffic has moved to file lockers.

My point was that the same people who know how to use Newzbin know how to use a VPN.

For newzbin it may be true, but not for thepiratebay where the majority downloaders are just regular people who wouldn't know about VPN or do not know how to use it or simply do not care and move on.

Importance of newzbin block is that it paved the way for more blocking of piracy sites. They're now after thepiratebay and many more piracy sites will follow down the shitter pretty soon. Of course there's still workaround the block, but they have all the time in the world now to add more sites to the filter and to improve their blocking tech. Once the court precedent has been set, it is just a matter of time now when pirates will loose most of their UK traffic.

Good news from Holland today too, BREIN shut down one of the largest news services, news-services.com:

http://torrentfreak.com/major-usenet...-order-111106/

About time to shut down that usenet thing as it is next to 100% copyright infringment media now that hardly carries any legit use anymore.

I can still access Newzbin2 on a BT line and that is without any workarounds.

The argument that "it wont stop it completely so we refuse to try" is really absolute twaddle.

Non of the laws that society upholds successfully completely stop further instances of that crime. We lock up thieves everyday - theft still exists.