Hotfile Goes To War Against Copyright Infringers

[Aussie Rebel]

Interesting read

Hotfile Goes To War Against Copyright Infringers

Hotfile, one of the rising stars on the file-hosting scene, appears to be taking a tougher stance on copyright infringement. Perhaps with an eye on the litigation recently instigated by the MPAA, this week Hotfile has been deleting premium accounts ? along with all their files ? en masse. Furthermore, Hotfile are reportedly not paying out the money these accounts have earned in the site?s rewards program.

hotfileAs bandwidth and storage capacity have increased, so have the capabilities of file-hosting services. Perhaps inevitably, not only are they used for the storage personal files, but increasingly for the distribution of movies, music, games and software.

Although the MPAA and RIAA have named two of the market leaders ? RapidShare and MegaUpload ? as ?rogue?, to date both sites have avoided becoming a target for litigation from the pair. The same cannot be said about Hotfile.

?In less than two years, Hotfile has become one of the 100 most trafficked sites in the world,? said the MPAA when announcing its lawsuit against the company. ?That is a direct result of the massive digital theft that Hotfile promotes.?

Furthermore, the MPAA insists that Hotfile?s business model encourages users to upload ?illegal copies of motion pictures and TV shows to its servers.? Even if this statement is true ? and there?s no evidence presented thus far to prove it is ? a development this week suggests that Hotfile is taking its DMCA responsibilities seriously.

?Those idiots closed my Hotfile account,? one premium account holder told TorrentFreak earlier today. ?No warning and now i?m just shut out. All my files are gone, everything.?

This is clearly not an isolated incident. On the contrary, recent Hotfile account suspensions are widespread. This morning TorrentFreak was invited to a private IRC channel and there we had a chat with individuals who had all lost premium accounts this week.

In our discussions with these and other people affected by the account suspensions, a common theme was developing. All had been operating premium accounts at Hotfile for some time, some of them for two years. Movies and TV shows were the major items being uploaded and all individuals were being paid weekly through Hotfile?s reward program.

Then this week they were all locked out of their accounts, only to be greeted by the following message:
Suspended

HotfileAccountSuspended

Although the above message promises account holders more information by email, the truth is that the message being sent says very little indeed.
Terminated

Hotfileemail

Hotfile aren?t answering any questions on the matter which is fairly normal since Hotfile rarely respond to any questions, their account holders tell us. Nevertheless, it is very clear that not only are the accounts closed, but all the files stored in them have been deleted too.

Another issue especially annoying to premium account holders is that they say that Hotfile owes them money earned in their rewards program. These are not always small amounts. Although we have spoken with people owed between $15 and $400, one individual says that he is owed more than $1,000.

A source told TorrentFreak that when it comes to taking down infringing files, Hotfile are one of the fastest file-hosters to do so, but these mass aggressive account suspensions are something new. For their part, Hotfile say that they have always terminated the accounts of users who have repeatedly infringed copyright since their Terms of Service forbid users from doing so. However, it appears that they will now go further.

?Recently, we have become concerned that despite these policies, some users persist in attempting to use Hotfile.com to share materials to which they do not have the necessary rights,? the company said in a statement. ?Therefore, we have implemented a more aggressive policy of terminating the accounts of users who are the subject of repeated complaints of infringement.?

In the face of this more aggressive stance by Hotfile, TorrentFreak is informed that UserShare.net and FileSonic could be favored by those we spoke with earlier, although there are dozens of alternatives ready to take up the slack.

source: http://torrentfreak.com/hotfile-goes...ingers-110219/

[Vick!]

I clicked this thread in hope to see some AR pics.
:/

[Agent 488]

thank god that nightmare is over.

http://www.filesonic.com/affiliate-program

[Barry-xlovecam]

I would think it 'legal posturing' toward some out of court settlement possibly ...

"... Furthermore, the MPAA insists that Hotfile?s business model encourages users to upload ?illegal copies of motion pictures and TV shows to its servers.? Even if this statement is true ? and there?s no evidence presented thus far to prove it is ? a development this week suggests that Hotfile is taking its DMCA responsibilities seriously. ..."

[andrej_NDC]

They just found a nice way not to pay affiliates. They don't really give a fuck about MPAA.

[CaptainHowdy]

Originally Posted by Agent 488

thank god that nightmare is over.

http://www.filesonic.com/affiliate-program

[cooldude7]

Originally Posted by andrej_NDC

They just found a nice way not to pay affiliates. They don't really give a fuck about MPAA.

+1

[ottopottomouse]

Originally Posted by andrej_NDC

They just found a nice way not to pay affiliates. They don't really give a fuck about MPAA.

bingo !

[{Psycho}]

All Evil things have to end someday

[woj]

Originally Posted by andrej_NDC

They just found a nice way not to pay affiliates. They don't really give a fuck about MPAA.

[Barry-xlovecam]

If they paid affiliates to recruit filesharers, and those filesharers uploaded copyright infringing content, that might be difficult to defend in a lawsuit claiming that they "encouraged copyright theft."

[Paul Markham]

They are clearly not able to delete an uploaders entire account and files.

Fabian Thylmann told me so and therefore it must be right. LOL

[L-Pink]

Originally Posted by Barry-xlovecam

If they paid affiliates to recruit filesharers, and those filesharers uploaded copyright infringing content, that might be difficult to defend in a lawsuit claiming that they "encouraged copyright theft."

They were "rewarding" and encouraging copyright violators for their own monetary gain. I wouldn't want to defend that.


.

[blackmonsters]

It's funny how the people with closed accounts are complaining about not
getting paid when they stole the content to begin with.

"You can't steal from me for stealing."

[L-Pink]

Imagine if I opened a warehouse and paid out money to people that brought me other peoples property.


.

[Horny Dude]

Closing one still only opens another one. You hardly ever see a Rapidshare link on a file sharing website. Everyone knows you put anything on RS that is even remotely pirated they remove it. Hotfile and Legitbit are all over the place, just name the file something else and they leave it alone. They only delete it when the name is: due-date-dvd-rip.rar or something that totally tells you what it is. Not sure of what they can do, but it's a growing problem.

[seeandsee]

they earn on that and they care only for press

[Barefootsies]

Originally Posted by andrej_NDC

They just found a nice way not to pay affiliates. They don't really give a fuck about MPAA.

Summed up nicely.

[Hentaikid]

What kind of "personal files" would people have to share that couldn't be sent as an attachment via gmail, for example? What is the non-pirate use of these services? 0.00001%? I'd be surprised if it's more. Anyone sharing legitimate large files is going to be putting them up on youtube (for video) or places like sourceforge

[Young]

people will just move on to the next big thing.

when rapidshare started cracking down mostly everyone just moved on to hotfile. others went elsewhere. as soon as hotfile starts cracking down there are a ton of other sites waiting in the wings.