government seizes domains alleged to infringe copyright

bittorrent based dns to counter US domain seizures
from pcmag: The U.S. government has shut down several sites apparently suspected of either linking to or providing access to copyrighted materials. Visitors to Torrent-Finder.com and other sites were met with a notice that the site's domain name had been shut down by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement - Homeland Security Investigations department, pursuant to a seizure warrant that would apparently be issued by a judge in the future.

It was unclear how many sites the ICE took down or otherwise took over, with TorrentFreak publishing a list of sites that had been taken down. If that list is accurate, only a few apparently disseminated links to BitTorrent trackers, the master index for distributing a given file across the Internet through the BitTorrent network. Such sites included Torrent-Finder.com, but also mydreamwatches.com and nfljerseysupply.com, among others. Others apparently distributed rap music.

"ICE office of Homeland Security Investigations executed court-ordered seizure warrants against a number of domain names," ICE said in a written statement to the UPI. "As this is an ongoing investigation, there are no additional details available at this time."

The move appears to be completely independent of COICA, the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act making its way through the U.S. Senate.

related: in the wake of 'cablegate' -
why hasn't the govt seized the domain name wikileaks.org?*
uk police to get major new powers to seize domains*

update: dhs seizes more domains; this time for linking to copyrighted material

end of the internet as we know it?

US Senate Committee in a lame duck Congressional session passed recently the Combating Online Infringements and Counterfeits Act (COICA). Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights group, calls it an 'internet censorship bill'. "Clearly this was funded by media cartels, but this has a lot more to do with Internet censorship as it does about copyright infringement," says Activist Post entry.

In "Stop the Internet Blacklist", Rhode Island State Representative David Segal writes: "COICA creates two blacklists of Internet domain names. Courts could add sites to the first list; the Attorney General would have control over the second. Internet service providers and others (everyone from Comcast to PayPal to Google AdSense) would be required to block any domains on the first list. They would also receive immunity (and presumably the good favor of the government) if they block domains on the second list." Welcome to the Brave New World!