Nicki Minaj Quits Twitter To Protest Against Leaked Songs

April 18, 2012 by Yonah · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events, Entertainment Industry, File-Sharing Programs, Networks & Services, Legal P2P News & Issues

We all remember how Metallica took the fight on music piracy a decade ago, fueling other artists to do the same. While Hetfield & Co. may have changed their stand in the meantime, others like the currently en vogue female rapper Nicki Minaj have just getting started with their anti-piracy protests.

After accusing her fan site NickiDaily.com of leaking a couple of songs from her newest album “Pink Friday: Roman Reloaded”, Nicki wrote on her Twitter account:

“Like seriously, it’s but so much a person can take,” she wrote on Sunday just before closing her account.

Her first album, “Pink Friday”, was considered a huge success in 2011, but after this reaction the famous artist may just lose a couple of fans.

On the same note, the popular blue-rock band The Black Keys has criticized services like Spotify and Rhapsody for not returning more money to the artists. We are inclined to believe that we will see more protests of this kind in the near future.

Studies show that rap music is one of the most pirated genres around. So, whether this is just a marketing gimmick from Nicki’s part or she’s really upset about those leaked songs is about to be revealed in the near future.

By that we mean that if someone leaked the tracks, her record label could go after the person who did it. And, as we all know, there are criminal penalties involved when it comes to the distribution of copyrighted materials before they’re released.

Tags: anti-piracy, copyright, file-sharing, p2p leaks

YouPorn’s Premium Accounts Leaked

February 28, 2012 by Yonah · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events, Entertainment Industry

YouPorn (the notorious porn video website) is placed on the top 100 most popular websites in the world, according to the Web information company Alexa. Unfortunately for the company, the website’s database was hacked. The security breach occurred as a third-party chat service (YP Chat) failed to properly secure its user data.

Anders Nilsson – a security blogger – claims that over a million YouPorn users’ credentials were made public due to the recent hack attack. As a result, YouPorn’s chat site has been disabled until an investigation is to be carried out, says the Luxembourg-based Manwin Holding SARL. Kate Miller – a spokeswoman for Manwin – added that the site was run by an outside company on separate servers; as such, there was no breach at YouPorn itself.
This is not the first time when hackers focused their attention on adult portals, as Brazzers also had their user-base exposed in the past.

However, the bigger issue here is that many internet users have the same password for multiple websites, such as PayPal or Amazon. If that’s the case for you, it’s strongly recommended that you change your password as soon as possible.

Tags: p2p leaks, porn

First Episode of TV Show Revenge Finds Its Way onto Torrent Sites

September 7, 2011 by Yonah · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events, Downloads, Movies, MP3, Digital Audio & Games

TorrentFreak spread the news that the first episode of the upcoming TV-series Revenge is now already available on p2p networks.

While the ABC planned to broadcast the show on September 21, file-sharing websites are assaulted by users who are just not willing to wait until the official launching.

As TorrentFreak points out, while some years ago the tag PREAIR was quite popular among the TV shows fans because it was used on P2P and Scene releases as a sign that the respective TV-show leaked on BitTorrent before the official broadcast, now its usage decreased considerably.

‘Revenge’ is an American TV drama inspired by Alexandre Dumas’s The Count of Monte Cristo starring Emily VanCamp and Madeleine Stowe.

Revenge – download link (Kickasstorrents)

Tags: file-sharing, p2p leaks, torrents

New Windows 8 Build Leaks onto P2P Networks

June 21, 2011 by Yonah · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events

With more than a year ahead of its official release, Windows 8 finds its way onto torrent sites – more precisely, a leak of the new build of the OS, 7989 had many already cheering at its features.

A detailed inventory of what has been found under the hood of the future platform and the reasons it has generated so much excitement was done at redmondpie.com. The features include a new virtual keyboard, per-feature licensing, support for geo-location and SMS.

The new virtual keyboard has received a smooth, catchy face-lift that bears larger keys, quite compatible with one tablets and touch-screen PCs.

Microsoft’s intention to employ Windows 8 on future tablet devices instead of Windows Phone becomes pretty clear.

With regard to App Store and per-feature licensing, Redmond Pie notes:

Windows enthusiast Thomas Hounsell has posted on his Twitter account several details about Windows 8′s hidden features. By reverse-engineering certain files, Hounsell uncovered code that pointed to an App Store and more importantly, the ability to unlock certain individual features within the system. While it’s still no indication on what Microsoft plans to do with this, per-feature licensing could do away with Windows editions: instead, all users would start with a single, “bare bones” edition of Windows and purchase individual features as they saw fit.

Microsoft’s server operating systems have allowed this for years, although all “upgrades” are free of charge. This proven feature has allowed IT managers to easily customize their servers installations to their needs anytime they see fit. Bringing this down to the client level would certainly benefit power users.

As final point, we leave the implementing of APIs that detect a machine’s location (as featured on Mac OS X Snow Leopard) and support for SMS, signaling once again that with Windows 8, Microsoft wants to go a bit mobile.

Tags: p2p leaks, torrents, windows

LulzSec Hacks Sony Again

June 16, 2011 by Yonah · Comments Off
Filed under: Announcements & Events

LulzSec is well known for hacking several times Sony’s websites. They did it once more – for the sixth time – this time releasing 54MB of Sony Computer Entertainment Developer Network source code and maps of Sony BMG’s internal network.

Sowngae 2 can be found on PirateBay, just as Sownage 1 was posted no more than a week ago under the same group. During this month, Lulzsec compromised Sony’s database containing personal information of over 1.000.000 users, including their passwords, e-mail addresses, home addresses, dates of birth and all Sony opt-in data associated with their accounts.

This is what the group had to say on its posting from Pirate Bay:

Konichiwa from LulzSec, Sony bastards!

We’ve recently bought a copy of this great new game called ‘Hackers vs Sony’, but we’re unable to play it online due to PSN being obliterated. So we decided to play offline mode for a while and got quite a few trophies.

Our latest goal is “Hack Sony 5 Times”, so please find enclosed our 5th Sony hack. Enjoy this 54MB collection of SVN Sony Developer source code,” it said in a press release.

Enjoy this 54MB collection of SVN Sony Developer source code. That’s hackers 16, Sony 0. Your move!
ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: HACK SONY 6 TIMES! Oh damn, we just did it again, please also find enclosed internal network maps of Sony BMG.

Lulz Security.

This is the same team that stole The X-Factor’s contestant database from Fox.com earlier this month and hacked PBS.

Back in April Sony shut down its PlayStation Network due to similar acts of aggression.