Anti-Piracy law Firm ACS:Law taken down by DDoS attacks.

[K9]

ACS:Law is a firm which specialises in sending out threatening letters somewhat indiscriminately to people accusing them of illegal filesharing, and threatening court action unless damages are paid. 4Chan and some others hit them with a DDoS attack, which opened up their mail server database or something, and all their internal e-mails are now being leaked around the interwebs.

Reading about these chaps they seem like a properly evil bunch of fuckers, preying on people.

[Chimpy]

There are a few organizations now that are solely geared towards scaring people into a financial settlement. I eventually had to just ignore them when I was working on the DMCA notices for the ISP I worked at because they wanted written confirmation on the first notice from every end user and would send a "final notice" with threat of legal action within less than the 10 days allowed as part of the DMCA from the time of reciept of the notice until takedown was required.

Usually it was for porn, or for Frank Zappa music (the Zappa Family Trust uses one of those shady places, apparently).

But regardless of the bastardry of the firms in question, the DDoS attacks do nothing to help the cause of the people committing them.

[Engels]

Well, except the DDoS attack has revealed that the law firm are pirates themselves, albeit with money as their object. It is nothing short of shakedown tactics en-mass. I wouldn't be surprised if this gives rise to criminal prosecution of the law firm.

From the articles on that site, its hard for me to tell what criteria is being used to find people to shake down. It seems they have 'honey pot' torrents by which they capture IP addresses, and then with collaboration of the ISPs, determine the user information and contact them thereafter. I know that there's similar practices in the US.

What seems clear is that someone in the law firm isn't being particular about the accuracy of their IP data and hence the shakedown goes out to innocents.

[Arthur_Parker]

What seems clear is that someone in the law firm isn't being particular about the accuracy of their IP data and hence the shakedown goes out to innocents.

I think it's worth highlighting that they are intentionally targeting gay porn titles while aware that some people are innocent of any file sharing activity.  I don't think that the gay aspect is a coincidence and I'd love somebody like stonewall to get involved and screw them over for that as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11418970

The UK's Information Commissioner (ICO) has told the BBC that the firm behind a leak of thousands of Sky broadband customers' personal data could face a fine of half a million pounds.

The list, produced by ACS:Law, contained the names and addresses of more 5,300 people alleged to be illegally sharing adult films online.
...
A spokesperson for Sky told BBC News that they were "very concerned at the apparent security breach involving data held by ACS:Law".

"At this stage of our investigation, we believe that the data included the names and addresses of around 4,000 Sky Broadband customers," they said.

"Like other broadband providers, Sky can be required by Court Order to disclose information about customers whose accounts are alleged to have been used for illegal downloading. We only ever provide such data in encrypted form."

[Ironwood]

Yes, I'm sure Sky only produced that data because they were forced to.  I'm sure there was no kind of reciprocal arrangement of payment for said list.

 

[Arthur_Parker]

Yes, I'm sure Sky only produced that data because they were forced to.  I'm sure there was no kind of reciprocal arrangement of payment for said list.

It's a legal requirement which also states that the initiator of the court order have to pay an admin charge to the isp, I believe from what I've read so far.  There's a pretty big plusnet thread with their CEO responding, still reading it.  I doubt an isp would be foolish enough to try to make money out of this, considering they should be aware how twitchy their customers are about this type of issue, not saying it's impossible though.

Plusnet thread.

Edit to add.
http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,85908.464.html

All;

I want to outline the position I'm going to take with ACS:Law.  Currently, I'm not going to share any reports with the community, and this is unlikely to change in the short term - there are a number of factors in the reason I've taken this decision.  The main reason is because while a number of our customers are unhappy with the approach taken by ACS:Law I have to be confident that any disclosure would not damage any further action Plusnet may choose to take in future, at this point I'm not satisfied this is the case.  I would again ask that Plusnet customers who are concerned about this issue and that have received letter from ACS:Law the NPO of the 19th of November to contact the support team, as to date I've received a very limited response. 

However, this doesn't mean that we are not continuing to review and I remain passionate about raising our customers concerns to ACS:Law about the experience they have received.  Since this was brought to my attention we have had repeated correspondence with ACS:Law, and I assure you we will continue to do so over the coming weeks to seek clarity on a number of issues.  Explicitly, I have asked the legal team again today to respond to a number of points raised in our correspondence with ACS:Law.
 
I also wanted to explicitly answer a number of questions raised recently:

Has Plusnet ever challenged the evidence of the monitoring?
- To date we have not challenged any of the evidence.

Are Plusnet going to challenge the evidence presented in future court order applications made?
- At this point we will review our approach based on each individual application.

Are Plusnet going to start charging the solicitors a fee for processing this data?
- We will charge any solicitors a fee for the data moving forward.

What are PN going to do to help their subscribers who have received letters like this?
- We are going to produce an FAQ, including advice explicit content on seeking advice from Citizen's Advice Bureau, and explaining your rights to complain to the SRA etc and update our internal training processes within the CSC.

Any questions then please ask, or PM me.

Thanks,

Fletch

Interesting, some customers want the isp's to ensure they always charge for supplying contact details, as that cuts into the profits of the ACS when they get people who don't respond and also slows them down.

[Arthur_Parker]

This case is going to shake up everything.

One of the emails sent from BT to ACS with an unsecured (either password or encryption) was with PN customer details.
Sky was the same, O2 managed to at least password protect their spreadsheet.

http://twitter.com/ACS_LAW_ILLEGAL

http://twitter.com/#search?q=%23acslaw

[Ironwood]

Sky are the most dishonest bastards around.  Seriously. 

[Arthur_Parker]

Pick a post code.

Text NSFW
http://34d.me/index.php?postcode=SW1A+0AA
Text NSFW

 

[K9]

Ho hum, that's a lot of people.

Also some of those films just sound terrible.

[Ironwood]

Jesus, downloading the same movie 10 times.  I guess the wife kept finding it.

[Arthur_Parker]

Top tip, don't google image search The Cockfather 

[K9]

I never knew we were a nation so intrigued by granny fucking 

[Ironwood]

It's always on my mind.

Oh no, wait.  It's not.

 

[Arthur_Parker]

http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,85908.928.html

You won't necessarily have lived at the address we provided to ACS:Law. We gave them the address which was *current* at the time they requested this data. The data is typically requested months after the alleged infringement took place.

 

[Arthur_Parker]

Law firm ACS: Law stops 'chasing illegal file-sharers'

A lawyer has dramatically withdrawn from pursuing alleged illegal file-sharers in the middle of a court case he brought.

The patent court in London is currently scrutinising 26 cases brought by ACS: Law on behalf of its client MediaCAT.

The law firm had sent thousands of letters to alleged file-sharers.

But in a statement read to the court, solicitor Andrew Crossley, said he had now ceased all such work.

He cited criminal attacks and bomb threats as reasons.

"I have ceased my work...I have been subject to criminal attack. My e-mails have been hacked. I have had death threats and bomb threats," he said in the statement, read to the court by MediaCAT's barrister Tim Ludbrook.

"It has caused immense hassle to me and my family," he added.

In September ACS: Law was the victim of a cyber attack which exposed thousand of its e-mails online.

These e-mails detailed all the people it was pursuing and the pornographic films they were accused of downloading for free.

The data breach is the subject of an ongoing investigation by the Information Commissioner and Mr Crossley could face a hefty fine.
...
Mr Crossley is subject to an ongoing investigation by the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
...
Judge Birss also questioned why MediaCAT wanted to drop the cases.

"I want to tell you that I am not happy. I am getting the impression with every twist and turn since I started looking at these cases that there is a desire to avoid any judicial scrutiny," he said.

The case was made more complicated by the fact that a new firm, GCB Ltd, had begun sending similar letters, including one to one of the defendants who had been told just the day before that no further action would be taken.

Judge Birss said he was considering banning MediaCAT from sending any more such letters until the issues raised by the cases had been resolved.

Doing so, he said, would be a highly unusual move but one made more likely by the fact that Mr Crossley had said in his statement that there were "no new letters pending" and that GCB Ltd had also halted its work.

The judge was keen to find out what the relationship was between GCB and ACS: Law, something Mr Crossley sought to clarify in his statement.

He said that he had no connection with GCB Ltd beyond the fact that the founders of the firm had previously been employed at ACS: Law.

The case has raised some serious questions about how copyright firms pursue file-sharers.

Barristers acting on behalf of the accused questioned whether an IP address - a number assigned to every device connecting to the internet - could be used to identify the person who downloaded illegal content.

Barrister Guy Tritton also questioned the nature of the letters sent by ACS: Law, asking why it described MediaCAT as a "copyright protection society," - a title that he said was "misleading".

Judge Birss is expected to deliver his judgement on the case later in the week.

You know you have fucked up when you can't stop a case you started. 

[Ironwood]

"It has caused immense hassle to me and my family," he added.

Fucking Comedy Gold.  Treat others as you would like to be treated, Motherfucker.

[Arthur_Parker]

He said that he had no connection with GCB Ltd beyond the fact that the founders of the firm had previously been employed at ACS: Law.

Telegraph

Today the Metropolitan Police told The Telegraph it had no knowledge of any bomb threat against Mr Crossley or ACS:Law.

PC Pro

“I know Dave Fisher is put down as a director [of GCB], [but] this activity was done without him knowing what activity was happening,” Champion added. “I think he’s taking steps to make sure all that money’s been repaid.”
When PC Pro contacted David Fisher directly he declined to comment and hung up.
The “friend” David Fisher appears to have helped out was ACS Law solicitor Andrew Crossley. Fisher and Crossley are known associates, with internet searches revealing correspondence between the two.

Judgement should be very interesting.

[K9]

"It has caused immense hassle to me and my family," he added.

Fucking Comedy Gold.  Treat others as you would like to be treated, Motherfucker.

Schadenfreude is a motherfucker

[Ironwood]

You're mistaken if you believe that I'm getting shits and giggles from death threats to a blokes family.  Nevertheless, the irony on this one is thick and delicious.

[bhodi]

Considering he claimed a bomb threat when none had been reported, I suspect a tiny bit of hyperbole on his part.

[Paelos]

You're mistaken if you believe that I'm getting shits and giggles from death threats to a blokes family.  Nevertheless, the irony on this one is thick and delicious.

That's ok. I am.  

Mostly because he's writing them to himself.