Google Now Censoring BitTorrent, RapidShare
Google has silently rolled out a filtering system to please the entertainment industry.
As promised weeks ago, Google is now actively censoring search terms such as "BitTorrent," "torrent," "utorrent," "RapidShare" and "Megaupload" from its instant and auto-complete services. The move to censorship arrives after feeling tremendous heat from the entertainment industry to filter "piracy related" terms from its search engine.
Although Google didn't make a formal public announcement, TorrentFreak reports that Google has compiled a list of keywords that no longer activates auto-complete. The contents of the list are unknown, and the current method of censorship does not currently effect full search results. However curious seekers can test the new filter by entering "BitTorrent" or other piracy-related words in the search window. The keyword "BitTorrent" does not appear when typing "Bitt"and doesn't appear in Google Instant.
The censorship also doesn't stop with just one keyword. As TorrentFreak points out, combinations are also banned. For example, the search term "Ubuntu torrent" will not be suggested as a user type in Ubuntu, nor will any other term coupled with the word "torrent." This obviously fights against those looking for "Avatar torrent," "One Night in Paris torrent," or other possible copyright infringing torrent downloads.
Obviously RapidShare isn't too pleased with the new filter. "We knew about Google’s plans for quite a few weeks now," the company said. "We embrace that certain search suggestions will not put a wrong complexion on RapidShare anymore, but we are concerned that at the same time the legitimate interests of our users will also be affected. We believe it was the wrong decision to remove the term ‘RapidShare’ from the search suggestions."
BitTorrent's Simon Morris said that Google's filter was too broad. He pointed out that it doesn't cover other pirate-related terms like "The Pirate Bay" and "ISO Hunt."
"There’s no reason for Google to throttle search results for our trademarks, including BitTorrent, µTorrent and torrent," he said. "Indeed, they do still enable auto-complete for many third-party clients that use the BitTorrent protocol, including BitComet, BitLord, and even sites like The Pirate Bay and Isohunt."
Morris said the inclusion of Xunlei in the filter list is a little hypocritical since Google is one of the investors in the Chinese BitTorrent client. "Google did invest $5 million in the company in 2006, according to reports," he said. "We sincerely hope Google will recognize the value of BitTorrent and reevaluate this decision expeditiously."
To read the full report, head here.
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But But, How will I find my Linux Mint Torrent.
D:
This only affects those too lazy to type the entire word content of their intended search. Not a big deal.
Aren't the people most likely to use those terms probably the people who have a problem with auto-complete anyway?
A fellow I know released an album on the internet on the new year. Within 3 days of the release of the album, perhaps 8 or so of the results Google came up with weren't about a torrent or RapidShare link to download it illegally. There were literall THOUSANDS of illegal download links within 3 days of him posting the release. It was just shameful.
Why does anyone even use Google anymore? I seriously wonder.
Title FAIL!
There is NO censoring at all.
This is journalism at its worst. Do not post false titles to draw people to articles. I expected better, Tom's...
Still comes up for me in chrome. I type in "bit" and the first thing that instantly pops up is the full address for bittorrent. I've never even been there before, I use utorrent. =\
why don't they just stop returning search results for those sites? no one really uses them for demos or videos or what legal manner people are claiming now-a-days.
ehh.....
it's not censoring...
it's just the autocomplete that's taken out...
Google is still the best torrent search engine...period!
Title FAIL!There is NO censoring at all.This is journalism at its worst. Do not post false titles to draw people to articles. I expected better, Tom's...
Agreed.
A fellow I know released an album on the internet on the new year. Within 3 days of the release of the album, perhaps 8 or so of the results Google came up with weren't about a torrent or RapidShare link to download it illegally. There were literall THOUSANDS of illegal download links within 3 days of him posting the release. It was just shameful.
I'm surprised it wasn't 3 days BEFORE the release.
I have to agree that taking it out of auto-complete hardly counts as censoring.
I still remember in the 1990s when it was nearly impossible to find anything you're looking for to pirate on the internet. People are spoiled these days on the internet.
Oh woes me how can Google do such a thing as not auto type a search for someone. This is so horrendous.
@rooket, yeah the good ole 90's if you wanted to do something similar it was a crazy arse warez site with a 10 step process that had 50 fake links and one real one and the file you got was compressed in 2 or 3 obscure formats to prevent anyone not very techy to be so lost they would never do it. That our you traded files via IRC.
Interesting, but not surprising.
Heh..
Text entered: Obama free..
Text suggested by Google: "obama free speech zones".
They haven't censored it yet, and it would be foolish of them to do so.
As often used as Google's search engine is, prohibiting terms like this would cause people to use an alternate search engine. What I don't understand is why everyone in the US is afraid of the media industry, even the government itself. Has the mafia found a new outlet or something?
Grow a spine and tell the media industry it isn't your problem and they can't do anything but cry about it since there is no legal liability for the search providers.
WTF Google, i tought your with us .
just tested it... typing in part of the word "bittorrent" won't bring up anything in the auto-search or auto-complete, but once I get the whole word typed in, it auto-searches again and the first link is bittorrent's website. So yeah... half-hearted effort at best, and I'm glad for it. Do just enough to grease the squeakiest wheels.
I use Google auto-complete for the Android App store, and that's about it. It must just be me or Opera, but that new live-result search thingy never propagated to my computer. I've seen it no my wife's computer, but I still have to hit enter before I get any search results (yes, auto-complete does appear for me).
I just don't like the precedence this sets. I'm sure a lot of companies depend on auto-complete and what not for a significant flow of traffic. Sure, for now Google is censoring for "copyright holders (a-la "won't somebody think of the children"), how long before they start censoring for profit? I wonder, will Google still allow those terms for its advertisers? Pay us $XXXX to put your search term at the top of auto-complete? I dunno, just sayin.
I was already starting to use Bing for searches anyway.... try it and compare I have found a wider range of results than Google anyway!
Filtering of any sort is a failure of their principles even at this miniscule stage.
Google=Filtering=Dying
Anyone who uses Google to search for their torrents obviously doesn't have a stack of favourite sites they get their torrents from.
and yet another reason I use Startpage search engine, completely anonymous searching and works alot better, google is old news to me.
OMG! Just type what you want and press enter! It's only been a few months since you've had to not press enter. Nothing has happend.
ehh.....it's not censoring...it's just the autocomplete that's taken out...
Why would they blacklist specific terms from auto complete in the first damned place? Because some of their big spenders said so. This is designed to meant to hinder searches for those terms. That's how it starts, small, so nobody notices. Bit by binary bit.
maybe 'bittorrent' should change their name to 'googlz', so google would have to filter out the word starting with 'googl...'
LMAO torrents as big of a waste as P2P was, shut em all down RIAA and MPAA!!!
What happened to don't be evil, Google? Bowing to pressure to censor is a bit evil, don't you think?
Do No Evil.. except maybe side with RIAA and MPAA.
Can't get much more evil than that.
Doesn't matter anyway. Just more people moving to Bing.
No problem with that.
As long as they're not removed from the search results (as this terrible title seems to imply), I'm fine with it. Who needs auto-complete anyway.