CloudFlare Can Be Ordered To Disclose Science Piracy Website Owner Details (thestack.com) 55
An anonymous reader writes: A New York judge has ruled that CDN provider Cloudflare can be compelled to disclose customer details for the domains libgen.io and bookfi.org, both of which are alleged to provide pirated access to scientific and technical papers, infringing the rights of controversial academic publisher Elsevier. Judge Robert Sweet ruled 'The evidence set forth...demonstrates that Elsevier (publisher who filed the lawsuit) is unable to identify the operators of libgen.org or bookfi.org, or the true location of the computer servers upon which those websites are hosted, absent the ability to take discovery from Cloudflare.' Sweet's ruling refers to 'absent identifying information' necessitating an injunction for Cloudflare to surrender details intended to begin an investigative financial trail to the domain registrants. This information could have been provided by British company TLD Registrar Solutions, who registered libgen.org in 2012 -- and hardly seems likely to retrench under pressure, given the oft-criticised transparency of legal process between the U.S. and the United Kingdom. ICANN and WHOIS also seem like obvious first points of enquiry (however ICANN's secession from control by the United States government at the end of September may have complicated using it as a legal resource), but apparently, neither can help.
Thanks (Score:1)
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I too thank Elsevier for this new information. I already use sci-hub for my professional work because it's better than my uni library's services. I found out about it from a similar news article a while ago.
Where should OneHundredAndTen and I be looking to be aware of these kind of resources? I don't have the energy or inclination to stick it to the Man, I just read lots of scientific articles for my work. So if I got out more... or... less, what else do I need to know to do my science efficiently and add t
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of course the publishers and authors need to be paid for their work
Authors (and peer reviewers) of scientific papers are usually not being paid for that by the publisher.
Re:Thanks (Score:4, Informative)
You're missing the OP's point, which is that this is an example of the Streisand Effect. Many people may not be that actively interested in reading scientific papers, but then they read articles like this about Elsevier going after these "pirates", and look into the issue, decide that Elsevier's actions and monopolization of the industry are abhorrent, so they go to the pirate sites and start reading, then they tell their friends all about it, and it snowballs.
We've seen this over and over and over on the internet: when some powerful interest wants to shut something down they don't like, it just brings attention to it and makes it even more popular.
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I'm in the UK so get forwarded to http://www.ukispcourtorders.co... [ukispcourtorders.co.uk] which lists lots of sites to get even more things from. Thank you British government!
publishers holding all the keys again (Score:1)
Piracy: providing a public service distribution since at least when the floppy disk was invented.
In the pursuit of scientific knowledge, no one should be restricted due to their current wealth status.
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"Me wish happy birth-day is yours!" o/~
But Ugg owns intellectual rights to round wheels. Entire human species owes Ugg royalties. Also some animals. Also most extraterrestrials.
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God made nature, so all scientists owe royalties to God. Checkmate, atheists!
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Just the same, what fraction are published in myriad shit journals is useful and what are just there to give professors something to publish their crap in?
It is in the interest of these authors these crap journals continue to exist, and they have to pay for themselves somehow, and these meagre subscriptions are it. Now you seek to eviscerate it?
Tl;dr There's plenty of ignoble behavior to go around.
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Heaven forbid people get paid for their hundreds of hours of work
Yo, fuckhead, scientists doesn't make money by charging by the download.
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You don't have ANY idea how Elsevier works, do you? ...
Or did I miss a joke?
The more you know... (Score:2)
Which is pretty ballsy given that the Italians were rumored to assassinate your ass [allaboutlean.com] for that kind of behavior.
Sigh (Score:2)
UK Data Protection laws would prevent the disclosure of a British domain name owner's data to a non-EU law process, yes.
But a valid UK court's request for the same would be accepted.
Why haven't they tried to compel a UK court to agree to disclose that information for the purposes of law enforcement?
If they have, and they've been denied, I'd be very interested in the reasoning because there's not much reason to refuse if it's got to the stage of a cross-border copyright infringement. So I'd guess that they
"Science Piracy"? Awesome. (Score:2)
If you're against something you shouldn't make it sound so cool.
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"We are the Committee to Stop Cool Sex-Havin' Fast Car-Dirvin' Badass Science Sharing."
SubjectsInCommentsAreStupidCauseTheSubjectIsTFA (Score:2)
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Libgen.org registered via proxy service (Score:1)
As a scientist... (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't even understand what "science piracy" might mean. The whole reason for scientific work to exist, is to be disseminated. Paywalled scientific journals are exactly the antithesis of what science is, which is openness, exposure, universal access.
Re:As a scientist... (Score:4, Insightful)
Also a scientist; I say it's not even piracy. Piracy is downloading something you didn't pay for. If I download, for example, the new Star Wars VII or Civ 6, that would be piracy, because I would be getting something that someone else made, with their money, with the intention of making a return on that investment, without paying a fair price for it.
On the other hand, if you download something that was made at a public institution, build and run with public funds, by a group in some part funded by public money grants, than that is not stealing; that is getting what you are owed. Demanding that someone should have to give $39.99 to some leech-weasel publishing company to get access to something they already paid for is the real piracy going on here. Elsevier and their ilk are stealing from the public.
Science needs to be open to everyone, not just those of us lucky enough to have institutional access (and hell, where I am, I don't even have easy access to all years for all journals, stupid as that is). I've no sympathy whatsoever here for them, and I'd bet they don't even lose money anyway when some curious individuals 'pirate' scientific articles, because most people aren't going to pay $40 for something that may or may not be pertinent to what they want to know. I'm not at all one of those people who rejects the idea of copyright and IP in general, not at all, but Elsevier and the rest of them are thieves, and they can take their copyright and shove it up their ass.
If science piracy is giving the public access to what they are entitled to and supporting the principle of scientific openness for all people, than long live science piracy.
Rule of law, or of scofflaws? (Score:2)
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It is my opinion that the current copyright law is in violation of the US Constitution. The Supreme Court disagrees with me, but that doesn't change my mind, because their reasoning was faulty. Therefore the current copyright law is invalid. My obedience to it is mainly because it doesn't interfere with what I choose to do, and occasionally because of fear. I and if a work is in print and has existed for less than 20 years I feel that the FORMER copyright law (prior to the Walt Disney extensions) should
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If the argument is made about what is enforced, I agree with you completely. If the argument is about what is legal, I disagree.
I do understand that different people will have different opinions, and that society depends upon a certain consensus of behavior, but while I may obey laws that I consider illegal, I don't respect them. And others are less obedient.
A decent society depends on decent laws. When the enforced laws are so blatantly illegal it inspires widespread disrespect for the laws, and obedien
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