Warner Brothers has taken its piracy policing to the extreme by reporting its own website.

The famously litigious movie studio put in requests for Google to remove its own website from search results, citing copyright law violation as the reason, reports copyright new site Torrent Freak.

Warner also asked Google to remove links to film streaming sites run by Amazon and Sky, as well online film reference site IMDB.

Warner regularly reports pirated content to the search engine company, but the latest round of take-down requests appears to be full of legitimate websites, including its own.

The requests were made on behalf of Warner Bros by Vobile, a company that uses video tracking technology to help companies enforce copyright on their content.

The official Warner Bros web page for 2008's The Dark Knight was among the URLs that Google was asked to remove.

Several requests were also made in relation to the 1999 sci-fi film The Matrix, again including Warner's official site for the movie.

'Warner is inadvertently trying to make it harder for the public to find links to legitimate content, which runs counter to its intentions,' said Ernesto van der Sar from Torrent Freak.

Google spotted the mistakes and decided not to remove links to Amazon, IMDB and Sky Cinema, though the Warner URLs still remain under review, reports Torrent Freak.

A Google transparency report shows that Vobile has submitted more than 13 million requests for URLs to be removed .

Along with Warner Bros., the company also works on behalf of Netflix, Paramount and MTV owner Viacom. </s> (Reuters) - A federal appeals court on Tuesday revived a Wikipedia lawsuit that challenges a U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) program of mass online surveillance, and claims that the government unconstitutionally invades people’s privacy rights.

A man is silhouetted near logos of the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) and Wikipedia in this photo illustration taken in Sarajevo March 11, 2015. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/File Photo

By a 3-0 vote, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia, said the Wikimedia Foundation, which hosts the Wikipedia online encyclopedia, had a legal right to challenge the government’s Upstream surveillance program.

The decision could make it easier for people to learn whether authorities have spied on them through Upstream, which involves bulk searches of international communications within the internet’s backbone of cables, switches and routers.

Upstream’s existence was revealed in leaks by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden in 2013.

Lawyers for the Wikipedia publisher and eight other plaintiffs including Amnesty International USA and Human Rights Watch, with more than 1 trillion international communications annually, argued that the surveillance violated their rights to privacy, free expression and association.

The U.S. Department of Justice countered that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act had authorized Upstream’s review of communications between Americans and foreign “targets.”

In October 2015, U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III in Baltimore dismissed the lawsuit, finding a lack of evidence that the NSA, headquartered in Maryland, was conducting surveillance “at full throttle.”

Writing for the appeals court panel, however, Circuit Judge Albert Diaz found “nothing speculative” about the Wikimedia Foundation’s claims.

Diaz said the NSA interception and copying of communications showed “an invasion of a legally protected interest - the Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.”

The foundation could also pursue its First Amendment claim because it had “self-censored” some communications in response to the Upstream surveillance, Diaz said.

By a 2-1 vote, the same panel also ruled the plaintiffs lacked standing to challenge the NSA’s alleged “dragnet” to intercept “substantially all” text-based communications to and from the United States while conducting Upstream surveillance.

Justice Department spokesman Mark Abueg declined to comment.

Patrick Toomey, an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer representing the plaintiffs, said the ruling means Upstream “will finally face badly needed scrutiny” in the courts.

“This is an important victory for the rule of law,” he said in a statement. “Our government shouldn’t be searching the private communications of innocent people in bulk.”

Some Democratic and Republican lawmakers are working on legislation to curtail parts of Upstream. A section of FISA that authorizes the program expires at year end.

The case is Wikimedia Foundation et al v National Security Agency et al, 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 15-2560. </s> CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt’s top administrative court ruled on Saturday that regulators must block the video file-sharing site YouTube for one month over a video that denigrates the Prophet Mohammad, a lawyer who filed the case told Reuters.

A lower administrative court had ordered that the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology block YouTube, owned by Google, in 2013 over the video, but the case was appealed and its ruling stayed during the appeal process.

The ministry at the time said it would be impossible to enforce the ruling without also disrupting Google’s Internet search engine, incurring potentially huge costs and job losses in the Arab world’s most populous country.

The Ministry of Communications and Information Technology was not immediately available for comment. YouTube appeared to be working in Egypt on Saturday as of 1250 GMT.

The film “Innocence of Muslims”, a low-budget 13-minute video, was billed as a film trailer and made in California with private funding. It provoked a wave of anti-American unrest in Egypt and other Muslim countries when it appeared in 2012.

Mohamed Hamid Salem, a lawyer who filed the case in 2013, said the ruling also orders that all links that broadcast the film be blocked.

The ruling is considered final and cannot be appealed. </s> Wikipedia is suing the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) for their illegal mass surveillance of the general public, claiming the Obama administration unconstitutionally invaded people’s privacy rights.

A federal appeals court on Thursday revived the lawsuit, agreeing by a 3-0 vote that the Wikimedia Foundation could challenge the government’s “Upstream” surveillance program.

Yahoo News reports: The decision could make it easier for people to learn whether authorities have spied on them through Upstream, which involves bulk searches of international communications within the internet’s “backbone” of cables, switches and routers.

Upstream’s existence was revealed in leaks by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden in 2013.

Lawyers for the Wikipedia publisher and eight other plaintiffs including Amnesty International USA and Human Rights Watch, with more than 1 trillion international communications annually, argued the surveillance violated their rights to privacy, free expression and association.

The U.S. Department of Justice countered that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act has authorized Upstream and its review of communications between Americans and foreign “targets.”

In October 2015, U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III in Baltimore dismissed the lawsuit, finding a lack of evidence that the NSA, headquartered in Maryland, was conducting surveillance “at full throttle.”

Writing for the appeals court panel, however, Circuit Judge Albert Diaz found “nothing speculative” about the Wikimedia Foundation’s claims.

Diaz said the NSA interception and copying of communications showed “an invasion of a legally protected interest – the Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.”

The Wikipedia publisher can also pursue its First Amendment claim because it had “self-censored” some communications in response to the Upstream surveillance, Diaz said.

By a 2-1 vote, the panel also ruled the plaintiffs lacked standing to challenge the NSA’s alleged “dragnet” to intercept “substantially all” text-based communications to and from the United States while conducting Upstream surveillance.

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Patrick Toomey, an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer representing the plaintiffs, said the ruling means Upstream “will finally face badly needed scrutiny” in the courts.

“This is an important victory for the rule of law,” he said in a statement. “Our government shouldn’t be searching the private communications of innocent people in bulk.”

The case is Wikimedia Foundation et al v National Security Agency et al, 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 15-2560. </s> A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court ruled the Wikimedia Foundation has standing to sue the National Security Agency over its "upstream" surveillance practice, reversing a lower-court decision tossing the group's case.

An attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, which brought the case, called the decision an "important victory for the rule of law."

"The NSA has secretly spied on Americans' internet communications for years, but now this surveillance will finally face badly needed scrutiny in our public courts," Patrick Toomey said in a statement. "We look forward to arguing this case on the merits," he said.

This ACLU argues that the "upstream" surveillance of the internet's "backbone" of digital networks violates constitutional protections of free speech and privacy.

The NSA recently announced it will no longer permit intelligence officials to collect emails, texts and other communications between two people who mention a target by name, but are not themselves targets of surveillance. The agency said it will limit such collection to internet communications sent directly to or from a foreign target.

But Toomey said he doesn't believe the agency's decision to scale back its surveillance will have an impact on the case.

While the NSA has suspended a controversial piece of its "upstream" surveillance, it still continues, Toomey said. Furthermore, the NSA hasn't said it won't go back to its broader collection practice in the future, he said.

"That makes it very important that we continue to press ahead with this challenge," Toomey said.

The 4th Circuit's decision only revives Wikimedia's claim; the court said other groups that brought the initial lawsuit in 2015—including Amnesty International USA and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers—don't have legal standing.

The 4th Circuit said Wikimedia's allegations are enough to "make the plausible conclusion" that NSA has intercepted and reviewed some of its communications. Wikimedia can sue under the First Amendment because it has "self-censored its speech and sometimes forgone electronic communications" because of the NSA's surveillance, the court said.

"Indeed, there's nothing speculative about it—the interception of Wikimedia's communications is an actual injury that has already occurred," Judge Albert Diaz wrote.

The government can ask the full 4th Circuit to hear the case. </s> File photo of plenary session in European Parliament in Strasbourg in France. | Photo Credit: REUTERS

European Parliament lawmakers on Thursday rejected a highly controversial European Union copyright law proposal that has pitted Beatles legend Paul McCartney against the creators of Wikipedia.

Members of the European Parliament, meeting in the eastern French city of Strasbourg, voted 318 against the measure, 278 in favour, with 31 abstentions. The draft law was firmly resisted by major U.S. tech giants as well as advocates of Internet freedom.

Resistance has been especially heated to Article 13: the proposal to make online platforms legally liable for copyrighted material put on the web by users.

Music legend McCartney as well as major music labels and film studios have lobbied politicians urging them to back the changes.

But critics warn the reform will lead to blanket censorship by tech platforms that have become an online hub for creativity, especially Youtube. It would also restrict the usage of memes and remixes by everyday Internet surfers, they say.

Wikipedia went down in at least three countries on Wednesday in protest aagainst the European Parliament vote.

"The directive will threaten online freedom and would impose new filters, barriers and restrictions to access the web," Wikipedia Spain said in a statement.

The second disputed aspects to the proposed reform are an effort to boost revenue for hard-up news publishers and a crackdown on non-copyrighted material on tech platforms such as Google-owned Youtube or Facebook.

Major publishers, including AFP, have pushed for the news media reform — known as article 11 — seeing it as an urgently needed solution against a backdrop of free online news that has decimated the earnings of traditional media companies.

But U.S. tech giants and Internet freedom activists are against the idea, calling it a "link tax" that will stifle discourse on the Internet.

They also argue it will only benefit well-known news providers to the detriment of independent and start-up news companies.

Thursday's parliament vote is not final, but only sets out the negotiating position of the Members of the European Parliament.

There then follow negotiations with member-states for a finalised law, which Austria, holder of the EU's six-month rotating presidency, would like finished by the end of the year. </s> The European Parliament, an ongoing source of heartburn for Internet companies, just passed a law making them legally liable for copyright infringement by content users upload on their platforms. Legislation like it, called SOPA/PIPA , was proposed and defeated in the U.S. in 2012.

The dramatic move pit artists against web platforms. Called the Copyright in the Digital Single Market Directive, it seeks to apply “the rights and obligations of copyright law” to the internet, lawmakers said in a statement after voting 348 to 287 in favor. YouTube, Facebook and Google News are some of the internet household names that will be most directly affected.

The directive enhances the ability of rights holders — musicians, performers, writers and publishers — to negotiate better deals for the use of their works online. “It does this by making internet platforms directly liable for content uploaded to their site and by automatically giving the right to news publishers to negotiate deals on behalf of its journalists for news stories used by news aggregators,” the European Parliament said.

Thousand of artists had signed a petition backing the directive led by film producers like Pedro Almodovar and Michel Hazanavicius, Amba’s Benny Andersson, author Ali Smith, and independent music labels.

Passage infuriated proponents of the open Internet, who argue that copyright restrictions will chill free speech. Internet companies and trade groups lobbied furiously and a band of 200 European academics signed a petition against it. Protesters in Germany, Sweden, Poland, Switzerland, Austria, and Portugal also took to the streets to campaign against the restrictions, which still need approval by individual EU member nations.

The debate is an echo of a battle Stateside over legislation called the Stop Online Piracy Act (in the House) and Protect IP Act (in the Senate) that initially had widespread support in Congress but folded under a massive lobbying and PR blitz by the Internet industry. Major websites went dark on a coordinated day of protest and Congressional servers were overwhelmed by angry consumer emails. The copyright issue has not been raised again since and U.S. creatives operate on a “notice and takedown” regime, where platforms remove infringing content after being advised it’s there. That requires a level of constant policing that can be hard, especially for smaller independent producers.

Opponents fear sites will over-block or self-censor to avoid litigation and that smaller sites that can’t afford to filter content won’t have a fighting chance.

“In a stunning rejection of the will of five million online petitioners, and over 100,000 protestors this weekend, the European Parliament has abandoned common-sense and the advice of academics, technologists, and UN human rights experts, and approved the Copyright in the Digital Single Market Directive in its entirety,”’ wrote the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The directive was introduced in 2016 and watered down from previous iterations. It makes platforms liable for content users upload, with exceptions for some material like GIFs. It mandates that journalists get a share of copyright-related revenue obtained by their news publisher. Start-up platforms are subject to lighter obligations.

In a Twitter post, Google Europe said the directive would “lead to legal uncertainty and will hurt Europe’s creative and digital economies.”

Axel Voss, the European lawmaker behind the directive, called the law “an important step towards correcting a situation which has allowed a few companies to earn huge sums of money without properly remunerating the thousands of creatives and journalists whose work they depend on.”

"This is a directive which protects people's living, safeguards democracy by defending a diverse media landscape, entrenches freedom of expression, and encourages start-ups and technological development. It helps make the internet ready for the future, a space which benefits everyone, not only a powerful few,” he said. </s> The U.K. government has revealed a set of planned “extreme” measures to sanction tech companies which fail to remove “harmful content” online, including terrorist content, self-harm, bullying, and child pornography, but also “extreme pornography,” “trolling,” and “disinformation.”

The plans were published on Monday as a White Paper on the official website for the U.K government.

“The paper’s definition of harmful content is broad, ranging from terrorist content, to images of self-abuse, and child sexual exploitation,” reported Business Insider, adding that the policy paper “lays out several more extreme punitive measures which the government is considering.”

The White Paper also notes that its definition of “harmful content” includes “behaviours which are harmful but not necessarily illegal,” and specifically mentions “disinformation”, “Extreme pornography,” and “trolling” as examples of “harmful content.”

The proposed government powers reportedly include fines, the “ability to force third-party companies to shut down anything which, ‘directly or indirectly facilitates access’ to content from a website that’s in breach,” the ability to downgrade the offending company’s results on search engines, the ability to block offending company’s websites in the UK, the ability to make companies hand over any information related to their response to the “harmful content,” and the ability to hold individual company executives legally liable for content deemed harmful.

UK Culture Secretary Jeremy Wright claimed on Monday that the government fines could be “up to 4% of global turnover,” and as reported by Business Insider, “if a website flouted new rules, the regulator could make Google downgrade search its results,” and the “regulator might also be given the power to pressure firms that run app stores — namely Apple and Google — to delist or deprioritise apps that feature harmful content in some way.”

Business Insider also reported that the government paper “acknowledged that geoblocking sites would present ‘technical limitations,’ presumably because savvy users would be able to access blocked sites through a VPN (virtual private network),” however the government still notes “that the threat of ISP-blocking would still act as a ‘powerful deterrent.'”

On its ability to hold individual executives accountable, the government paper declared, “This would mean certain individuals would be held personally accountable in the event of a major breach of the statutory duty of care.”

The White Paper also discussed the “threat” of Internet anonymity, and claimed the government and law enforcement “are taking action to tackle this threat.”

“The police have a range of legal powers to identify individuals who attempt to use anonymity to escape sanctions for online abuse, where the activity is illegal,” the White Paper explained. “The government will work with law enforcement to review whether the current powers are sufficient to tackle anonymous abuse online.”

One section of the White Paper, dedicated to “disinformation,” cited the “Russian State” as a “major source of disinformation,” and declared, “Inaccurate information, regardless of intent, can be harmful – for example the spread of inaccurate anti-vaccination messaging online poses a risk to public health. The government is particularly worried about disinformation (information which is created or disseminated with the deliberate intent to mislead; this could be to cause harm, or for personal, political or financial gain).”

“The tragic recent events in New Zealand show just how quickly horrific terrorist and extremist content can spread online. We cannot allow these harmful behaviours and content to undermine the significant benefits that the digital revolution can offer,” declared Culture Secretary Jeremy Wright and Home Secretary Sajid Javid in the White Paper. “While some companies have taken steps to improve safety on their platforms, progress has been too slow and inconsistent overall. If we surrender our online spaces to those who spread hate, abuse, fear and vitriolic content, then we will all lose.”

“So our challenge as a society is to help shape an internet that is open and vibrant but also protects its users from harm. The UK is committed to a free, open and secure internet, and will continue to protect freedom of expression online. We must also take decisive action to make people safer online,” the two proclaimed. “This White Paper therefore puts forward ambitious plans for a new system of accountability and oversight for tech companies, moving far beyond self-regulation. A new regulatory framework for online safety will make clear companies’ responsibilities to keep UK users, particularly children, safer online with the most robust action to counter illegal content and activity.” </s> Watch out, National Security Agency: Wikipedia is coming after you.

On Tuesday, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 3-0 to revive a lawsuit brought by the Wikimedia Foundation — the nonprofit that operates Wikipedia — claiming that the NSA’s massive surveillance program is unconstitutional and invades people’s privacy. The case will now head back to Maryland court, and its impact could be enormous.

Not only will it likely reveal more about the secret NSA surveillance program — it could also potentially end such surveillance, explained Jennifer Granick, director of civil liberties at Stanford Law School’s Center for Internet and Society. “This is a chance for a real challenge to the programmatic nature of the surveillance.”

“The NSA has secretly spied on Americans’ internet communications for years, but now this surveillance will finally face badly needed scrutiny in our public courts,” American Civil Liberties Union attorney Patrick Toomey said in a statement. The ACLU is representing Wikimedia and the case’s eight other plaintiffs, which include Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International USA.

“Our government shouldn’t be searching the private communications of innocent people in bulk, examining the contents of Americans’ emails and chats day in and day out,” Toomey said.

In October 2015, a federal District of Maryland judge dismissed the case after ruling that Wikimedia and its fellow plaintiffs couldn’t prove that their communications had been captured by the NSA’s warrantless “Upstream” collection program, which involves vacuuming up people’s communications as they fly through internet cables, switches, and routers.

But the judges of the 4th Circuit found that the NSA has probably seized at least some of Wikimedia’s communications without a warrant, due to both the sheer volume of its communications and the fact that its users span the globe — meaning Wikimedia can continue to sue the NSA for violating the 4th Amendment.

And that’s not all. “Because Wikimedia has self-censored its speech and sometimes forgone electronic communications in response to Upstream surveillance, it also has standing to sue for a violation of the 1st Amendment,” the judges found.

“The idea that when people know that they’re being spied on, that they don’t say what they really think and they don’t read what they’re really curious about,” explained Granick, who filed an amicus brief on behalf of Wikimedia and the other plaintiffs. “They act differently, and the exercise of the freedom of speech and the freedom to read are curtailed or chilled as a result of this feeling that you’re being spied on.”

This is not the only pending legal challenge to the NSA’s warrantless surveillance programs. But in the past, Granick added, groups have struggled to prove that they were spied on under specific NSA programs and statutes because there’s so little information publicly available about them. The reach of NSA’s Upstream collection program on ordinary civilians was revealed thanks to documents leaked by whistleblower Edward Snowden.

The Justice Department didn’t immediately respond to VICE News’ request for comment, but the government has claimed in past court documents that Upstream’s warrantless surveillance is authorized under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which the ACLU contends is unconstitutional anyway.

However, the news isn’t all good for all the parties involved. Two of the members of the three-judge panel ruled that the case’s other plaintiffs, which include Amnesty international and Human Rights Watch, couldn’t prove that the NSA had also intercepted their communications. In a statement, the Wikimedia Foundation said it would work with its co-plaintiffs and the ACLU to “review the opinion and determine the next steps for our case.
Warner Brothers is accused of self-censorship after it tagged its own websites for copyright infringement through the search engine Google.