Microsoft has announced 63 new lawsuits against people the company is accusing of selling pirated Microsoft Windows products or Microsoft Office products on eBay and other auction sites.
The lawsuits are global and include pirates from the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Belgium.
The apparent target of Microsoft is people accused of selling Windows XP or Office “Blue Edition”, which are becoming more and more popular on auction sites as the company plans to phase it out.
Microsoft noted that the pirated copies pose a security risk to users as 43 percent “had tampered code that could create a backdoor into the person’s computer.”
Result for: ebay
According to a Waffles.fm post, the private music tracker has banned one of their “power users” after it was found that he was selling invites on the auction site eBay.
From the post, “Thanks to a cooperative effort with staff at what.cd, we’ve busted one of our own well-known members for selling invites on eBay. towelie, aka shad0w on what.cd, eBay username sueles810 has been banned, along with all of his invitees.”
Staff from both sites have long said they are scouring the Internet for users trying to profit off the site, and this member made it pretty obvious. All staff had to do was purchase the invite from the eBay auction and then see what nickname had invited them after they joined.
There is no word on whether it was all of the user’s “direct” invitees there were banned or everyone in his invite tree but chances are everyone was, unfortunately.
Result for: ebay
According to TorrentFreak, torrent popularity and torrent site traffic continues to grow with every passing day despite heated efforts by anti-piracy groups such as the MPAA and IFPI to slow piracy.
Using data from the traffic Tracker Alexa, TF compiled a list of the 25 most popular torrent sites and found the amount of growth since December 2007 to be, in a word, explosive. Many saw 40 percent or higher growth. Some saw as high as 400 percent growth.
The list, compiled originally here is as follows and shows the Alexa rank for the sites for December 2007, March 2008, and the increase (or decrease).
Rank # Torrent Site Alexa Rank (Dec 07) Alexa Rank (Mar 08) Change (%)
1. mininova.org 63 53 + 19 %
2. ThePirateBay.org 182 130 + 40 %
3. isohunt.com 170 147 + 16 %
4. Torrentz.com 231 192 + 20 %
5. BtJunkie.org 689 469 + 47 %
6. torrentspy.com 376 585 - 36 %
7. TorrentReactor.net 909 616 + 48 %
8. GamesTorrents.com 942 641 + 47 %
[More]>>
