University Bans BitTorrent Sites
While students at universities in the US are pressured by the RIAA, Cardiff University citing pressure from increasing numbers of copyright infringement notices, has taken out a blunt instrument and banned it’s students from accessing some of the world’s largest BitTorrent sites, regardless of the legitimate content they contain.
The Information Services department of Cardiff University in the UK has notified 25,000 students of its intention to protect the university from a rising tide of copyright infringement notices due to ‘inappropriate use’ of P2P. It will accomplish this by the wholesale banning of a whole range of BitTorrent search engines and trackers from the university network.
Previously, students using P2P applications Aimster, LimeWire, KaZaA, Mactella, Morpheus, Phex, iMesh, Qtella, Audiogalaxy, SwapNut, NeoModus, XoLoX , BitTorrent, WinMX, Gnutella, Gnotella, BearShare, Gnucleus and GTK-Gnutella had been told: “IMMEDIATELY ensure that your system is set to prevent the application from acting as a provider of unlicensed materials to other users.”
Its quite obvious that this message did not stop students from continuing to share files and the banning of the above sites is unlikely to stop them either. New sites appear all the time and although the blocklist takes out some major torrent sources, there are many hundreds more - e.g TorrentReactor.to is blocked but not TorrentReactor.net.
The excellent Yotoshi gets no mention and even President Bush’s torrent site is unbanned and fully available. Interested students will find the Linux stuff here.
:source: Source: TorrentFreak
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Feel free to view the letter that was sent to students from the College's Security Team at TorrentFreak. The list of banned websites is also listed there.
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
I understand the desire these large organizations have to cleanse their hands of P2P but I laugh on the inside knowing that it will always be there, ever changing and evolving.
Pirating and file sharing has become a part of every day life. People will always step up to the plate to devise new ways to share pirated software and such and to release it to the masses. How can you stop a non-profit pirating organization? We do it because we can, because it’s us against them and we will not stop until we’re all dead.
I’m glad I finally walked the ropes and got the whole newsgroup thing down. I’m not at a University but it sure does make newsgroups seem that much more sweet.
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
Thanks to the 3rd world! :D :P
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
couldn't u use a software firewall or maybe an ip blocker so the university wouldn't know wtf ur doing? idk. also, i use newsgroups also, but it doesn't always provide what i want and when i want it. sure, u get fast dl's, but it has it's share of probs and then u have the fact of damaged pars that u gotta find a fix for or hopefully able to fix urself. meh, i'll stick with bt.
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
Quote:
Originally Posted by
mr. nails
couldn't u use a software firewall or maybe an ip blocker so the university wouldn't know wtf ur doing? idk.
Peerguardian or a proxy? :idunno: I only go on my school's network for legit business...
But I don't live on campus so...:ermm: Stupid nonetheless if you ask me...
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
I never use the college or anything for bittorrent.
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
Quote:
Originally Posted by
mr. nails
couldn't u use a software firewall or maybe an ip blocker so the university wouldn't know wtf ur doing? idk. also, i use newsgroups also, but it doesn't always provide what i want and when i want it. sure, u get fast dl's, but it has it's share of probs and then u have the fact of damaged pars that u gotta find a fix for or hopefully able to fix urself. meh, i'll stick with bt.
Who the hell rattled his cage?? :ph34r:
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
in may uni its like that since 1 year
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
Come on this wont prevent anything? My school tried to stop us by putting up a software firewall that prevented the transfer of certain file types like filetypes with the extension .bc at the end n so on n so on. It did pretty much nothing
Re: University Bans BitTorrent Sites
Ach, my university just released an email about P2P networks. Just a general reminder...
Quote:
You may already know from the news media that *** is under intense scrutiny by
the Recording Industry of America and the Motion Picture Association of America
for the illegal use of Peer-to-Peer file sharing software by users of our
network. Using P2P file-sharing applications is not unlawful. However, it is
illegal to use such applications to download or make copyrighted materials
available to other users without permission. Even if the material, whether it is
a song, a movie, or software, was legally purchased by the owner, he or she must
take care to ensure that the material is not being inadvertently shared with
others.
Copyright infringement is a serious violation of the law, the Acceptable Use
Policy for the *** Network, and the Student Code of Conduct. In addition to ***
sanctions such as possible loss of network use privileges, members of the ***
community involved in this illegal activity could also be the subject of civil
and criminal actions imposed by the copyright owner. Statutory damage for
copyright infringements carries a minimum fine of $750 per item, song, or film.
Faculty, staff, or students who have installed peer-to-peer file sharing
programs on their computers and are concerned that they might be unwittingly
sharing files illegally should visit the University of Chicago's useful web page
(listed below) that describes how to disable file sharing on a variety of
programs.
Please help us continue to allow the legal use of this emerging technology on
campus. Do not share copyrighted materials illegally.
