ISOHunt search site lawsuit could make Google, Yahoo, others illegal
The owner of the ISOHunt search engine website (used specifically to find Bittorents submitted by users) is fighting the Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA) in court against claims that his site pirates music. The company’s president, Gary Fung, wants Canada’s Supreme Court to rule on the legality of search engines being used to identify material which may ultimately be used illegally to determine if they, too, are culpable.
Fung has reported receiving numerous legal threats from the CRIA, the Canadian equivalent of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). In response, he is fighting back in court, launching a lawsuit of his own.
The ruling could have very significant implications. Google, for example, can be used today to find pornography very easily — as can Yahoo, MSN, etc. In most states, viewing pornography below a certain age (typically 18) is illegal, yet it is very easy to bypass those kinds of security features on websites linked directly from Google searches. So is Google culpable for presenting material which may be used illegally? That’s essentially the very question Fung wants addressed.
Fung believes that using ISOHunt in a similar way to find Bittorrent sites (which may or may not carry materials that could be used illegally, and which may or may not ultimately result in illegal materials use) is no different. And his argument is that a search engine capable of finding potentially illegal material does not a crime make. In this way, he is forcing the issue to be resolved by the highest court in Canada.
Fung’s argument is very straight-forward — that his website never touches any of the files exchanged via Bittorrent applications, which are peer-to-peer and must be setup or launched externally to his page’s search results. And while his site is used to find the files, his participation in the experience ends there. A similar comparison could be drawn from asking some guy down the street where to buy drugs. That person might know, might even tell you, but until you actually go and buy drugs there no crime has been committed because having information is not illegal.
Fung is currently engaged in lawsuits with the Motion Picture Association of America, with court proceedings there lasting over a year.
Source: TGDaily
Comments(54)
damnn..does make sense…but damn !
Well he seems intelligent with some strong arguments.
I have no doubt that he is going to win this case.
yeah bring down the google empire!! woot..
yeah compare downloading to buying drugs woot..
Well, both ARE great fun…
CRIA is just being whiney. Long live bittorent!
CRIA, RIAA and more, wants to get their hands on anything that could make them some cash. If we look into everything in details like they do; we could also say that: salling chemical medicin that don't really heal, just cover or delay the symptoms, also is illegal. Polluting drinking water with toxin like flouride, and say: it's good for your teeth. lol FOR MORE INFOS, here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-_Li0axoPE
They BETTER look at themselves, instead of searching for other people's faults.
Music industry should be working hard on changing business model rather than wasting time and money on such cases. The only thing they'll win is contempt of the general people. Downloading can never be stopped. They might be able to close one site but they can't seriously be thinking that they can altogether stop this.
CRIA should decide if they want the levy from each blank/recordable CD/DVD sold in Canada or go after sharing sites. They can't have both.
search engine is a tool. tools can be used for legal and illegal. usage is the individuals responsibility. if you get stabbed do you shut down the knife company? someone throws a rock through your window and you blame what?
i've always wondered why someone doesn't use this argument as a defence because it's perfectly valid.
you can find all sorts of 'illegal' content in google and nobody gives a damn.
i wish him luck
Kinda like throwing the baby out with the bath water
mostly the same argument as thepiratebay's case which tottaly makes sense to me, they're only providing links not the material it self.
CRIA die mothafukers
Actually the argument is pretty weak. Say a terrorist asks you if you know where he can buy a bomb, you say yes, in fact you will drive him to the terrorists house and introduce the terrorist to the bomb maker.
Terrorist then blows up a train station with the bomb bought from the bomb maker.
Are you guilty?
Of course you are, even though you didn't make the bomb, plant the bomb or pay for the bomb.
The only gap in your logic is that apart from you most of us are not getting high 24 Hrs on weed so no terrorist will be going to ask that to anyone soon and what can possibly happen in real world is someone may take help from the yellow pages book to find chemical suppliers from whom he can buy considerably harmless ingredients for his homemade bomb.
Will that make the yellow pages publisher guilty?
Of course not, because weed is still bad for YOUR brain.
Whilst some people might see this as a weak argument, I see it as quite a strong one. Alot of torrents i've found, i've found using Google. They are the ones linking me to the sites – so they can not say they didn't do anything, because without them, alot of the stuff I got, I wouldn't have.
Personally I hope that ISOHunt wins, If not – I hope google, microsoft, yahoo all have very very good attornys to protect them from RIAA, CRIA, MPAA, etc…
~BW
Google is the biggest supplier of illegal content for me. And yet they are never held responsible. They couldn't clean it up if they wanted to.
its cops and bandits ppl…
either in the real world…or the internet..
They always made it that way…
Only through the net the bandit is maybe more protected.
Long live the skull flag…
@14: What are you on about? Ofcourse if you DRIVE a terrorist to a place to make a bomb you're guilty, But in what way is ISOHunt 'driving' us to download illegal content? (Metaphorically or not).
Your argument was a failure. Eitherway the guy has a good argument against CRIA and obviously google etc.
Stay off the fizzy drinks mate..They're making you crazy!!
Good luck to him.
Devilz.
Good luck to him, finally someone standing up and fighting back with the argument that'll make the difference.
i'd love to see him stand up in court and say "ok, type in axxo to isohunt. now type it into google. now tell me which one shows you were to obtain illegal content"
This is similar to how TorrentSpy went down. We'll have to wait and see what happens, but good luck isoHunt.
the same ridiculous argument that only an idiot would agree with..
ok.. as far as I can see pretty much all torrent stuff is illegal films/tv/music/software it's all copyright controlled and says so somewhere on original format.
lets say google is the doorway to your front door ..you can go anywhere there are millions of shops and tons of information a vast amount of options the whole world is your oyster in fact.. isohunt is a small site that "packages" illegal things and tells you where to get them.. gift-wrapped if you like.. and it's not like they can say they don't know what they are offering with categories such as movies which is then broken down into genres.. you also won't find child porn on isohunt ..which is also illegal.
they are posting stuff with total awareness of what they are doing so therefore they are breaking copyright laws instantly
at a minimum.
This is kind of like punching a baby in the face and then saying it's OK because the mother told you to do it. It's still illegal even if she told you to, his defense will never win.
I guess rlslog is next?
It's the same principle and in essence we are all here to download "free" software/movies/games etc.
Its agreed however that Fung has a case in the matter because ALL search engines will return the same results as ISOHUNT.
it's not "packaged" as Josa would have you believe because you can "package the results just as easily with any of the search angines by entering the correct search paramters.
If this stands up in court… then the times they are a changing.
Besides,its not illegal here in Canada to d/l torrents. Its a grey area at best.
Downloading copyrighted files isn't illegal, uploading/directly providing them without permission is.
With that out of the way, this argument has a strong and a weak point, and both of those are somewhat subjective in nature.
What I mean to say is, it most definitely is not illegal to provide information on where to obtain something illegally. IsoHunt is not enticing people to use BitTorrent for illegal filesharing, it is providing information where such activities take place. Much like me telling to anyone who asks, where some illegal dog-fight arenas can be found. Now if someone takes their dog to fight, am I to guilty for it? No. Comparing IH to Google is a bit of a flaw in the logic, because IH *specializes* in finding torrents, and makes them more accessible by categorizing them and such. Again, there are some websites that provide information on breaching security systems and protections of other people's web-servers and also there are sites that host information about suicide/homicide methods and those are not hunted down even though their service is of questionable morality and legality at best.
Comparing IH to Google is wrong because Google relies on user's affinities and search-fu (:D), while providing ANY and ALL information it mines and gathers. IsoHunt, on the other hand ONLY provides torrent-search tools. You cannot find anything else besides links to torrents and torrent information there. And it's a fact that most such information does lead to illegally shared copyrighted material. This is where the comparison loses ground.
Even if IH is not Google, it still IS NOT responsible for the actions of it's users. Furthermore, if this really is a question of legality, IH does not break any laws because it does not host even one byte of the material that gets downloaded or any other illegally shared copyrighted material, nor does it host or provide the torrents that are, in themselves, legally obtained. And possessing a .torrent file is not illegal in itself, regardless of the files it points to.
Shutting down IsoHunt won't lessen the amount of shared material, it will only make sharing a bit less convenient – nothing more, nothing less. And there is no legal reason why IsoHunt should be held responsible in the first place.
..so the defense that what he`s doing "isn`t a crime" and has been proved in court in several countries to "not be a crime" isn`t a defense???
…there are many metaphors and allegories on this page but harldy any of them are right….
…the end result may be a dubious one (ie the getting something without giving the RIAA, etc the blood they crave) but it has beeen proved again and again that metadata pointing to the torrents/ed2k files is NOT a crime and I don`t know why the courts are still allowing cases to come to trial that involve "search engines" and metadata…
and lastly:-
>>>>Johney666
…what the hell has any of this to do with "weed"??? and in fact for people who have passes puberty weed isn`t all that bad for your brain at all and all the independant research points to that, but the public dont get to hear that…the same as the public don`t get to hear that piracy hardly affects sales at all….
Toren Karelsa
http://www.cern.ch/
Thank you for linking to your source Vantec! Why does no one else?
@ 28
Will never hold up in court.
It would be the same to rape someone and then say because they looked at you it was alright.
The way I see it its the same as a lemonade stand sitting on the street corner its 150 degrees outside the lemonade stand has a big sign saying free. Do you take the free lemonade or do you suffer from heat stroke?
The Music/Movie industry has jacked up prices so heavily that it is 150 degrees and the sign that says free happens to be on their Highly over priced products.
They don't want their stuff pirated then they should drop their prices I would gladly buy dvds with all the special features and what not but not for $40 a pop F-That.
Im pretty sure by our laws here in canada you can have downloaded content as long as you are not distributing such content for free or otherwise. They have to prove this dude is distributing said files which he is not ….. Case dropped tax payers money's have been saved and the boot has been shoved down the CRIA's throat and right out the @$$ 0.
GAME OVER. Canadians should demand that the money for this court case is coming from the CRIA's Pockets instead of our tax dollars. This case has no merit and should not have even been let into a court room. This is the product of lawyers wanting a fat check and making some case out of absolutely nothing.
@ 15
this would be like stealing a car, then running down people on a crowded sidewalk, then saying "oh it's ok because the car isnt mine, I just used it". I hope he rots in jail.
"But in what way is ISOHunt 'driving' us to download illegal content? (Metaphorically or not)."
They are taking you directly to it (i.e. taking you directly to the illegal content). Get a clue pal, my bomb metaphor wasn't exactly cryptic.
I am a muppet, I post comments all the time, but I dare any of you to find one topic I actualy know anything about!!
Ghandi, you make an excellent point.
I was at Mediamarkt (it's this big store that sells electronics) the other day and they wanted, get this, 70 Euros for Fallout 3. 70euros is about USD110. More important than that: 70 euros is 3 tanks of Autogas for my car, so that's 1500km. 70 Euros is almost 20 packs of cigarettes. 70 Euros is food for 3 weeks.
I remember paying 100Marks (50 dollars) for Monkey Island 4 when I was younger. That was a fair price for an excellent game.
@32
Holy $hit you're an idiot!
The car (which represents isohunt) wouldn't be charged in court. YOU (being the end user) would.
You have just sadly disproved your own argument.
INSTA-FAIL! Go away.
hyp0xia wins a fluffy bunny for outstanding awesomeness
@ 36
No sh!t sherlock. Thats exactly the point I was making, the car is Isohunt, and the guy is saying he isnt guilty. are you ret4rded or something?
@38 the general theme of this discussion is not the guilt of the end user as that is obvious
I hope he wins. First of all, just because he has a search engine doesn't mean he is doing anything wrong. It is the people coming to that engine that are actively seeking out illegal content. If you go to a library to look up porn, the library is not doing anything wrong. You are the one looking it up. Also, I don't think it is any of anyone's business what you look up anywhere if you are doing it in the privacy of your own home.
And, these Movie and Music organizations need to stop intruding on privacy rights and fix what's really wrong in their industries.
Why the hell are people comparing search engines to rape and killing people what the… you people scare me.
Fair enough if you post a link to a site which tells you where to get hand grenades for free and this person actually personally gives them out then tells you how to use them to kill people, sure that would be illegal. although the link itself would not be illegal the site hosting the information probably would be.
People use these sites to find things be it illegal or not, they just provide a service. By a lot of people arguments for why it should be illegal then sites such as Google Maps, and the yellow pages should also be illegal because it might be used for illegal purposes. (Making bombs, and find location to place these).
It's not just search engines, what about email, forums, file hosting sites. They can all be used as a place to put links to illegal filez or meta data. Then who decided which meta data is good and bad? it's impossible you would have to ban everything good or bad.
At the moment it seems to be one rule for one set of people and different rules for others which obviously isn't right and should be taken to the courts for them to decide.
# 33 and # 15
Not really. this is just like if you slashed someone throat with a knife then tried suing the knife manufacturer claiming the knife slashed the throat, not you. This man broke the law, now it's time to pay the price.
@38
Here it is. Plain and simple.. This is why you fail at life.
The driver of your car is (what would be) the end user (the one doing the downloading) in this lawsuit. The end user in this lawsuit is NOT on trail. The "car" (owner/ioshunt) is. In your dumb little analogy, the driver would go to trail, not the car. Do you get it? The car wouldnt even be considered as the motivator. So quit now and stop saying that isohunt is the car, because isohunt isn't guilty, the goddamn user who completes the download (crime) and uses the software is.
Now f*ck off with your meaningless nonsense.
Wow all these metaphors are so damn bad.
@40.. you clearly know nothing about copyright law.
as far as pricing goes saying you would pay a small amount.. if they were going to do the same for all the things in the universe that would be fine but they won't so your argument is mute as well as selfish and very ill informed..
@43 both parties are infringing copywrite ..if they were blissfully unaware of the content they are advertising everywhere on the site (from which they make a tidy living by the way) they might have a small case.
its a little akin to someone in a shopping mall with keys to all the shops saying come get your free food/shoes/underpants/etc ..wonder how long he would last..
Go IH! We're cheering 4 yeah!
@31 Ghandi
"The way I see it its the same as a lemonade stand sitting on the street corner its 150 degrees outside the lemonade stand has a big sign saying free. Do you take the free lemonade or do you suffer from heat stroke?"
No it's more like someone asks you where he can find a lemonade stand, you tell him, then he goes to the lemonade stand and take a glass of lemonade without paying(steals a glass if you will). Does that make you an accomplice to the crime?
I basically agree with what #43 hyp0xia
@ 43
Its more like being a scumbag and stealing from someones back pocket, then when you get caught you say its their fault because there pocket is open at the top.
wait wait wait…its illegal to download porn under 18? but its ok to knock someone up. that makes sense. my right hand thanks me for watching pr0n b4 18!
@48
Holy $hit, you guys have the WORST analogies here. Stealing from somebody's back pocket it committing a crime DIRECTLY. This is NOT a direct crime, if it was, they would be hosting the content.
Anyway, there is no argument here since everyone continues to fail miserable at accurately replicating this scenario into an example.
And we all know everyone on this site are even more guilty than the ones here in court. So STFU you hypocrites and go register your copy of windows or something.
@ 50
you really have no clue what you are talking about, so just STFU before you sound even more dumb. The back pocket is a perfectly good analogy, you are just to simple minded to understand it.
@51 – complete and utter failure.
The analogy really is that the person stealing from the back pocket is the END USER. The owner of the back pocket are the software/recording industry. But let me guess, somebody like you would probably argue because the dudes shirt was too short, it exposed his back pockets and therefore we should sue the shirt. lmao.
Stop looking for someone else to blame for the crimes being committed by the END USER.
Do you want me to come up with an example for all you close minded, fools? Here you go..
Somebody gets mugged on the street for their wallet by a man with a gun. The individual who gets mugged decides to sue the manufacturer of the gun for 'providing a means to ensure a successful robbery'. Would the gun manufacture lose in court? No they wouldn't. /end argument
So the individual who was robbed now looks like a complete failure and decides to sue the government for allowing guns to exist in their country. Will the government lose in court? NO! (the government in this case represents the internet, which is the environment this crime is taking place). Or should we sue the f*cking internet as well? *slaps you in the forehead*
Now, the person who was mugged finally opens his eyes that appear to have been stapled shut, much a like most of the dumb comments here. And he sues the robber. And wins!
Yay, the first win in this discussion!
/end
Nice one!
What annoys me is how authorities come down brutally hard on pirates, and yet child pornography and the like continues to grow on mainstream sites and is accessible from mainstream ISPs. It's time they started taking more responsibility for more serious crimes.
I am fond of the original argument before all the analogies (that each have their own significant merit points depending on how they are viewed!) However it CAN be righteously argued that isohunt has a good case by snatching Google, Yahoo and the likes under the bus with them as well. Sure isohunt provides destinations to files that are considered illegal; and it is no different than RLSLOG (that goes a step further and provides visuals of images, boxshots, covers, branding, screenshots, reviews and descriptions, RSS feeds with links-2-torrent clients, etc.)
The point is: Google provides the possibility to find ALL of the so-called underground p2p network websites, trackers and all sorts of information regarding doing something illegal. Hell, you can type "I want to do something illegal" in Google and it will surely find a way to lend you such information (although I strongly advise you DON'T do that!!!) However, the smaller guys like isohunt, mininova, piratebay, demonoid, rlslog, etc. will not lend such information (unless it is a movie title, the name of song or application title…and I find that very unlikely!) Google (to name one) is really a larger fish than given credit because it is like the portal to every bit of nonsense and good sense a person wishes…not only is Google doing the same thing the accused website is doing–it is doing more (in both the so-called good and bad directions of Internet usage!)
Really how could anyone find all the lovely places to download movies, music and software without the helping hand of Google. Even if a developer eliminates the communication with the infamous GoogleBot it does not mean that a person will not speak about a place to download music in a forum, social network or blog that IS in comm. with GoogleBot for SEO purposes…these sites get found regardless!!! How hard would it be for Google to filter out torrents and everything associated with them…but why on earth would they want to do that? ISOHUNT WILL NOT GO DOWN ALONE…meaning they will WIN!!!