add site
services
publishers
database
health videos
toolbar
stats
live show
health store
more stuff
JOIN/LOGIN
| advertise add site services publishers database health videos
| | about toolbar stats live show health store more stuff JOIN/LOGIN |
This article is about the TorrentSpy website. For the TorrentSpy software application, see TorrentSpy (software).
TorrentSpy was a popular BitTorrent indexing Web Site. It provided .torrent files, which enabled users to exchange data between one another. It also provided a forum to comment on them and integrated a Digg-like user-driven content site ShoutWire's feed into its front page. In August 2007 there were more than 1,000,000 torrents indexed with thousands of new torrents indexed every day.[1] The Motion Picture Association of America filed a lawsuit in February 2006 for TorrentSpy facilitating copyright infringement as many torrents on its site were linking to copyrighted films. In December 2007 the court ruled against TorrentSpy for "widespread and systematic efforts to destroy evidence and have provided false testimony under oath in an effort to hide evidence of such destruction."[2] On March 24, 2008 facing further fines for not cooperating with the court, TorrentSpy shut itself down.[3] On May 7, 2008, a federal judge ordered TorrentSpy to pay the Motion Picture Association of America $110 million for alleged infringement of thousands of copyrighted film and TV shows. In a four-page final ruling, U.S. District Court Judge Florence-Marie Cooper entered the multimillion-dollar judgement against TorrentSpy parent company Valence Media as terminating sanctions for destroying evidence related to the case. Cooper also issued a permanent injunction against the Web site. "This substantial money judgment sends a strong message about the illegality of these sites," MPAA chairman and CEO Dan Glickman said. "The demise of TorrentSpy is a clear victory for the studios." Whether the MPAA will collect the $110 million from TorrentSpy remains to be seen. Court records show that Valence and TorrentSpy principals Justin Bunnell and Wes Parker have filed for bankruptcy.[4]
[edit] LegalIn May 2005, the site was forced to remove all torrents of Star Wars: Episode III after a stolen workprint of the film was leaked to the internet. In July 2005, searches for Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas were blocked "due to the request of the copyright holder, in compliance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA")". This limitation was later removed [1]. However, the ability for a copyright holder to request the blockage of a particular search query remained. In February 2006, the MPAA filed lawsuits against Torrentspy, isoHunt, and others for "abusing technology to facilitate infringement of copyrighted works." In March 2006, the site layout went through some changes, each category of a particular TV show were removed and also movie categories were radically changed and merged together under a Video section. The forum administrators only explained that the categories had changed, but not why. On May 29, 2007, A United States federal judge ordered that TorrentSpy begin monitoring its users' activities and to submit these logs to the Motion Picture Association of America. TorrentSpy's attorney, Ira Rothken, stated that TorrentSpy would rather deny access to U.S. users before it started monitoring anyone, since such monitoring is in violation of TorrentSpy's own privacy policy.[5] In August 2007, TorrentSpy began denying access to United States users and international users using US-based ISPs. In response, the MPAA filed documents calling TorrentSpy's denial of access "another illegitimate attempt by defendants to evade authority of this court and the May 29 order", and asking for sanctions. The tracker also reported that they were forced to handover all download logs to the RIAA. There were many ways to get to the tracker in the U.S by using a web based proxy but many people were scared of being caught.[6] The ability for users to make comments on individual torrents was also disabled at this time. On October 2007, a former TorrentSpy associate, Robert Anderson, said that the MPAA paid him $15,000 for inside information about the website. He was also able to hack into TorrentSpy's e-mail system and hand over confidential information to the MPAA. Even though MPAA admitted in the court having bought the inside e-mails, justice ruled that they contained no business secrets, nor that there would have been anything illegal in the procedure.[citation needed] [edit] Shut down On March 24, 2008, TorrentSpy's servers were shut down, shortly after a message was posted commenting on the end of TorrentSpy:[3]
Several days after the shut down of TorrentSpy, former employee Jason Hughes introduced his own bittorrent site called movieTorrents.[7] TorrentSpy has been ordered to pay $110m in damages to the Motion Picture Association of America for copyright infringement. [8] Members, mods, and admins of the TorrentSpy Support Forums, created by a member who went under the username Forcefire (although not officially a part of the TorrentSpy website), moved their operations to other servers and continue to thrive as the Mystery-Axiom Forums.[9] [edit] See also[edit] References
[edit] External links
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ↑ top of page ↑ | about thumbshots |
