Razorback2 Servers Seized

An anonymous reader writes "Slyck is reporting that Belgian and Swiss authorities have raided and seized Razorback2's servers. From the article: 'Razorback2 was an eDonkey2000 indexing server - very different in nature from an indexing site such as ShareReactor. Unlike indexing sites, Razorback2's index was only available through an eDonkey2000 client such as eMule. While it does not host any actual files or multimedia material, it does index the location of such files on the eDonkey2000 network. The legality of such indexing remains questionable, however this has not deterred copyright enforcement actions.'"

Decentralize

[ZephyrXero]

This is why decentralized file-sharing is the only way to go.... maybe now stuff like Waste or the more traditional Gnutella will gain a big rise in popularity?

Sucks...

[Anonymous Coward]

...because it was the biggest and best ed2k server but there are lots of others left. Also, there is KAD (kademlia - a decentralized search) which has pretty much replaced the ed2k servers for me (you get *FAR* more and way better results using KAD instead). The worst problem I see is more people will rely on KAD, increasing the server load...

Re:Decentralize

[zwei2stein]

Thats why eMule (THE ed2k client i might add) had Kademlia (decentralized ed2k-kinda-combatible network) running paralel to server network for quite a time...

Re:"A menace to society"

[insert cool name]

But from the article's description, RazorBack2 does seem to be host to all sorts of unsavory content

According to TFA they didn't host any content savory or otherwise, they just indexed what was available elsewhere. Kind of like a search engine does. . .

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http://www.jarfinder.com/ [jarfinder.com]

Re:I thought we settled this with hyperlinking?

[neo]

From the article:

Since November of 2004, authorities have closed down all of the major eDonkey servers in the United States, and now, Europe.

Re:Decentralize / Anonymous

[xiando]

I personally find anonymous Internet usage (regardless of protocol) a very good thing. http://tor.eff.org/ [eff.org] is very nice for the World Wide Web. However, it is very slow - but worth it if you want to be anonymous. The same applies to file-sharing if you like "that" kind of files. Tor can be used with _any_ P2P programs protocol and is thus highly recommended. I urge anyone who makes p2p software to immediately implement support for it. I agree decentralized file-sharing is good. Back in the 90s a lot of folks were doing centralized, they met in schools or other places and copied files. Those were called "copy-parties". The police, in their glory, rided some of those on behalf of the glorious Record and Movie Industry (RIAA/MPAA). Hmm. Now that sounds familiar. Wonder who oh who ordered the raid on the Razorback2 Servers? On a last point, please beware of this: There are information on the Internet that are very important but ignored and/or blacked out by governments and the corporate media. These video files are generally free and freely available on p2p services (like on my bittorrent TV site) but governments are willing to go to great length, even covert torture here in Norway, to shut such sites down. This is something one should consider seriously when reading about sites being shut down.

Re:Clarification please

[Anonymous Coward]

Peer guardian does not make it safe to download copyrighted material from the ed2k network although it may help a bit. The risk is low through safety in numbers. Reccently released films and music are probably higher risk than older stuff.

Yes, there are fake servers that filter search results or record users activitys. There are fake razorback servers active now.

I recommend either a) using emule set to not connect to a server and using kad
or b) turn off the options to auto update your server list from servers and clients, clear all the servers, update your server list from OCBMaurice's server list [no-ip.org] ocasionally. The gruk.org server list [gruk.org] went down along with razorback. All the other server lists I know of are out of date
or list fake servers.

Alternativley go back to using binary newsgroups. Less choice than ed2k but much less risk if you just download.

Does "we" mean the US?

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

In the US, there's an appeals court precedent about linking to illegal material [harvard.edu]. The law may depend on your (perceived) intent in making the link.

Re:Decentralize

[Hurricane78]

We also got mldonkey, supporting overnet and kademlia (a "remake" of overnet from emule), gnutella 2 and 1 AND some more... so as usual ther does not change a thing for most users. ;)

will offline-poeple ever get it? ;)

Re:Sucks...

[Anonymous Coward]

The worst problem I see is more people will rely on KAD, increasing the server load...

Please, get your facts straight!

Kademlia (short: KAD) is _NOT_ a centralized search facility, it is a search that goes just as much Peer 2 Peer as the downloading goes.

You ask your "neighbours" in the network, they will ask you, they report back to you, you to them and so on...

Therefore, your thought about "overloading the KAD-Servers" just wont happen, maybe your very own connection will use more resources for searching and giving results than before when everyone uses Kademlia but thats about it.

Read more about Kademlia here [emule-project.net]

Re:Why not a community based p2p client/network ?

[wiml]

There are several of these. Freenet (Ian Clarke's Freenet, not the other things called Freenet) is one good example. The problem is actually prety difficult: since you can't have any centralized servers, and you can't necessarily trust all nodes, it's really hard to write something that will do what you want.

There's a tension between privacy and speed; it's hard to get both, since if you keep information private then you can't use that information to optimize the network. BitTorrent manages to be fast in a wide variety of situations, but it doesn't keep any secrets. Freenet manages to be secure in a wide variety of situations, but it can be really sloooow. They take totally different approaches.

Re:I thought we settled this with hyperlinking?

[Haeleth]

While you have a valid point, your language is sloppy, and I'm going to pull you up on it, because using sloppy language on subjects like this plays into the hands of those who seek to restrict legitimate fair use as well as illegal copyright infringement.

But when the _only_ purpose of a server is to link to illegal content, you have to be retarded to think it's just for research, or study or for the sake that it's not illegal.

Illegal content wasn't the only purpose of Razorback 2. They linked to some legal content too.

Now, I don't deny that illegal content was the primary purpose. And it's perfectly legitimate to argue about where the cut-off should be, how much illegal use there needs to be before the technology should be banned; in the case of Razorback 2, you might even find that the vast majority of people agree that the illegal use so overwhelmed the legal use that the takedown was justified. But you should not just ignore the legal users - you should acknowledge them and present an argument that the authorities are acting in the common good when they act in a way that restricts those legal activities.

This intent of this server's owners is clear: they wanted to exploit a legal loop to provide copyrighted content.

This is the big mistake. You must not say "copyrighted" when you mean "unlicensed".

This post is copyrighted content. I own the copyright to it. But you are not infringing my copyright if you read this post, and you could email this post to everyone in the world if you like without infringing my copyright, because you have my permission to do that.

Similarly, if I compose a song, and record myself singing it, and give you a copy under a suitable Creative Commons license, you can upload that onto any P2P network you like - you will then be sharing copyrighted music that you don't own over a P2P network, and you will not be breaking any laws or infringing any copyright.

When you use "copyrighted" to mean "unlicensed", you strengthen the dangerous myth that copyright is a special thing that only protects commercial works, and that it's illegal to share copyrighted materials with your friends. The record companies want you to believe that, because they damn well don't want you to find out that there's free music out there that it's legal to copy and share, because that threatens their business.

It may sound like I'm nitpicking, but we live in a world where words have power. Words shape the world we live in. And if you let someone else define your words, you can only talk about the world they want to live in. You mentioned 1984 yourself: if you're familiar with the book, you're presumably familiar with Orwell's concept of the Party redefining words to make concepts like "freedom" and "democracy" literally inexpressible. We might not be heading quite that way yet, but we soon will be if we don't use words carefully rather than lazily.

Re:Decentralize

[m50d]

Ssh. Do not tell anyone gnutella's actually good now. Besides, it has the same "indexing nodes" situation.

My money's on gnunet [gnunet.org]. Not only does it have the whole anonymity thing, but it also actually works quite well as a filesharing network.

Re:Scary in another context.

[Rick.C]

My wife is a librarian, but I am not. (MWIALBIAN)

She informed me that there are specific State laws (in the US) that exempt libraries from copyright laws. That is why you can go to your local library and borrow a CD-ROM game or tax software or whatever, install it on your computer and use it until you have to return the CD-ROM. Even if the software doesn't check for the presence of the CD, you are morally obliged to delete it after you return the CD.

If the **IA wants to try to repeal these State laws, they are gonna get shushed into oblivion!