IP-WARS.NET || Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA

Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA

By peragrin, Section Microsoft Related Articles
Posted on Sun Dec 19th, 2004 at 14:16:52 EST

I came across this on a Macintosh site. The site it's self is basically a Mac only version of Slashdot, www.macslash.org. Link to article

To sum up the article,

MSFT contacted this web site provider, and asked them to remove the entire web site because their MSN search bot found a very old link to an outdated longhorn serial number. The comment was modded down to -1 and according to the logs the only person to see the comment in the past 8 months was MSN search bot.

The owners of the site after hearing about this from their provider, MSFT never contacted them directly, replaced the number with 0's.

Why is this IP-wars news? It's simple really MSFT is using it's new Search engine, and bots to scour the internet looking for violations of it's 'IP'. Which automatically forwards the information to MSFT legal, which sends out form letters using the DMCA to shut down sites.

This is why the DMCA is poorly written, and poorly conceived. In this case a web site basically got trolled and MSFT tried to use that to shut down the entire site. They didn't ask for the content to be removed. They didn't ever contact the site owners. MSFT went straight to the bandwidth provider(MacSlash owns the server, the provider has no software control over the server) and tried to force it to close the site. MSFT bypassed trying to be nice(surprised ?) and went to straight to trying to kill some one. Can you imagine how much money MSFT would lose in that court case? Considering since they basically lost to Linspire, even though Linspire did have to change their name but then again MSFT gave them $20 million to do that.

< Exhibit E: SCO's letter to IBM (21 comments) | Breaking News! (412 comments) >

Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA | 22 comments (19 topical, 3 editorial, 4 hidden)

Goodbye, msnbot. (4.00 / 5) (#11)
by tubby on Sun Dec 19th, 2004 at 23:57:24 EST
(User Info) http://www.sharedserver.org/tubby/limericks.html

It's funny that, even without this information, I recently decided to alter the robots.txt file for several of my sites to the following:

User-Agent: msnbot
Disallow: /

Now there's nothing in any of my content that I believe would give anyone reason for a takedown. It was actually after I had noticed logged attempts by the msnbot as it hammered a php script, apparently trying to suck content out of it. And also because I generally don't like the company.

I recommend the entry to anyone who has control over any robots.txt files.

--
:) 2004, The Tubby Nuisance Network
"All Wrongs Preserved."

Re: Goodbye, msnbot. by dwh97007, 12/20/2004 17:28:49 EST (3.80 / 5)
Re: Goodbye, msnbot. by Potential Recruit, 12/20/2004 15:44:12 EST (3.66 / 6)

Re: Goodbye, msnbot. by dwh97007, 12/20/2004 17:35:07 EST (3.75 / 4)

Re: Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA (3.87 / 8) (#2)
by heurtley on Sun Dec 19th, 2004 at 12:31:16 EST
(User Info)

One interesting part of this story is that the domain microsoft-antipiracy.com, from which take-down e-mails of this type originate, is registered with Microsoft's name and Redmond address but apparently hosted by an ISP called Nildram ( http://www.nildram.net ) in England. The web site http://www.microsoft-antipiracy.com is redirected to http://www.microsoft.com/piracy.

The only evidence that Microsoft is really behind these take-down e-mails is the MSN crawler reference to the activation code. Without that tidbit I'd assume that this was a case of European lawyer settlement trolling.

Re: Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA by peragrin, 12/19/2004 15:21:22 EST (3.66 / 6)
Re: Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA by Potential Recruit, 12/20/2004 15:23:01 EST (3.42 / 7)

Re: Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA (3.66 / 6) (#10)
by NilsR (nils@paragon.no) on Sun Dec 19th, 2004 at 20:15:00 EST
(User Info) http://home.c2i.net/nils_ragnar/nils/worldview.html

MSFT is using it's new Search engine, and bots to scour the internet looking for violations of it's 'IP'. Which automatically forwards the information to MSFT legal, which sends out form letters using the DMCA to shut down sites.

Is the DMCA really directly involved here? (It's not like threatening letters from lawyers never was sent to websites before the DMCA was created...) As an example, here is a letter that actually mentions the DMCA. Maybe your headline is a little strong?

--
An unmistakable sign of paranoia is continual mistrust.

No, they did not. (3.57 / 7) (#5)
by Potential Recruit on Sun Dec 19th, 2004 at 15:55:41 EST

"asked them to remove the entire web site"
They asked for removal of the offending material.
Much as we all hate M$ and the DMCA we should not
make false accusations.

Re: No, they did not. by mck9, 12/19/2004 16:40:31 EST (4.14 / 7)

Re: No, they did not. by Potential Recruit, 12/19/2004 17:15:33 EST (3.40 / 5)

Re: Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA (3.20 / 5) (#3)
by br3n on Sun Dec 19th, 2004 at 15:19:55 EST
(User Info)

this was an eye opener as if your isp isnt agreeable it could have meant the whole site coming down if i understand? dmca is looking worse everytime i hear about it.there is a site tracking take downs i will have to look and see if i can find it again.

br3n

Re: Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA by MadMax, 12/19/2004 19:54:01 EST (4.00 / 7)

Hence, don't be a lapdog to the US by Potential Recruit, 12/21/2004 13:09:45 EST (3.40 / 5)

Re: Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA by nedu, 12/19/2004 18:56:19 EST (3.83 / 6)

Just how easy is it to abuse the DMCA | 22 comments (19 topical, 3 editorial, 4 hidden)

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