Firefox Plug-in Makes Piracy Easy
Source: Tom's Guide | Keywords: pirates, amazon, firefox, bittorrent, plugin | Themes: The Internet
According to TorrentFreak The Dark Knight had been downloaded over 1 million times in under seven days of release. The MPAA and the RIAA are both actively looking for ways to shut down peer to peer file sharing while many internet service providers have turned to throttling download speeds when peer to peer transfers are detected.
However, this has not stopped a group of two coders (Enrique B. and John S.), calling themselves the Pirates of the Amazon, from releasing a Firefox plug-in that makes the process of finding and downloading pirated materials even easier. Under normal browsing of the Amazon.com online store, a user would see an “Add to Shopping Cart” button if an item is in stock. After the installation of this plug-in, users will see a new link under the title of the item that says “Download 4 Free.”
What this plug-in actually does is scan the popular torrent tracker thepiratebay.org and searches for the same media you are currently looking at on Amazon. If you have a BitTorrent client already installed on your computer, all you have to do is click on the “Download 4 Free” link after the plug-in has found the corresponding torrent file and the download will begin in your default torrent client.
This plug-in effectively allows for absolutely anyone to download pirated content using the navigational simplicity of the Amazon.com storefront. As of publication time, Amazon.com as not released any comment on this issue. It is important to note that even though the plug-in is a Firefox plug-in, there is still a chance of it being malicious software. TrendLabs, the makers of the TrendMicro line of anti-virus and security software, says that “Because Firefox extensions are executable code, the coder can do anything he wants, as long as he can code it.”
Mozilla, the distributors of Firefox also warns of installing unverified plugins and downloading any plug-ins from a source other than Mozilla’s database. The Pirates of the Amazon maintain that they are not affiliated with thepiratebay.org and do not host or link any illegal content. Their purpose of creating this project is purely artistic in nature and seeks to “address the topic of current media distribution models vs. current culture and technical possibilities.”
By now, everyone and their grandparents have heard of BitTorrent, the peer to peer transfer protocol that has taken over the internet by storm.
Bram Cohen, the creator of the original BitTorrent client and transfer protocol, originally intended his software to be used for coders to quickly and cheaply swap large amounts of Linux code online. But we all know how this story turned out; BitTorrent is now the most widely used means of piracy for the general internet public.
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now thats a clever idea. i wonder how long this plug-in will last?
lol!
There are many version of pirate of one program. How the plug in choose the right working pirate program?
convenient, however i prefer to search on my own
Just to be clear: Bittorrent IS used to distribute Linux distros, even if it's used for pirating, also. In fact, Linux distros download faster through Bittorrent than pretty much any other type of data because of the massive number of people seeding them.
i doubt this plugin will get popular but i hate to see people making it easier to spread pirated material.
There are many version of pirate of one program. How the plug in choose the right working pirate program?
I wonder this as well. It may be the first file. Which is retarded.
I don't remember it being that difficult to highlight a title and paste it into a new tab. And then I could find out of the file was crap ahead of time.
But I was talking to a Woman who had never heard of a Torrent, or BitTorrent, so apparently it's not as widely know as some of us may think.
Just to be clear: Bittorrent IS used to distribute Linux distros, even if it's used for pirating, also. In fact, Linux distros download faster through Bittorrent than pretty much any other type of data because of the massive number of people seeding them.
It sure is faster.
YA, I like it but like Tindytim said. Cut and paste ...not like news2me but easy for noob kiddies. For 99.999% I steer clear of torrents anyway, to slow4me. I use da groups, I like it better for numerous reasons.
This could be bad. Piracy is great when its confusing and only tech people can do it. You start bringing it to mainstream and companies start falling. Look at dreamcast. It failed because everyone was copying games...
IMO the only people that would be even thinking about installing this plugin are those people that already know how to find their own torrents to dl. These people already know that you can't just choose the first torrent listed and get the best copy. So really the only people that will be installing this are those that are just learning about using torrents. Once they realize that they aren't getting the best results from their downloads they will stop using it and start finding their own dl's.
Normal people don't use FF plugins, so this will only help current pirates make a few less clicks. Personally, I'd rather search myself and choose what to me looks like the best download.
"It is important to note that even though the plug-in is a Firefox plug-in, there is still a chance of it being malicious software."
Typical fear mongering. That's all they know what to say or do to combat something they don't agree with. It's pathetic and doesn't work 90% of time. Same with this whole BS with the "War On Drugs". Let's lie to kids and tell them a hit of Ecstasy can kill you, instead of offering knowledge and clarity on the dangers they just use fear.