It would appear that the United States government was on a bit of a tear this past week with seizing domain names of sites that traffic in illegal goods. From counterfeit designer items to sites that link to BitTorrent sites, everything was up for grabs it seems. The issues are that one of the sites was nothing more than a search engine and the second problem is that not even their host knew what was going on as it happened.
Currently if you go to Torrent-Finder.com you see the image posted below.
According to TorrentFreak, which spoke to the site’s owner, this seizure happened with no warning.
“My domain has been seized without any previous complaint or notice from any court!” the exasperated owner of Torrent-Finder told TorrentFreak this morning.
“I firstly had DNS downtime. While I was contacting GoDaddy I noticed the DNS had changed. Godaddy had no idea what was going on and until now they do not understand the situation and they say it was totally from ICANN,” he explained.
While we are not defending the trading of illegal files, the issue here is that Torrent-Finder (you can still see it at Torrent-Finder.info) does not run a tracker, nor does it host any files. The site is a search engine that uses iframe technology, so even when you do get search results, you are actually visiting the site with the files, it is merely wrapped in the Torrent-Finder site.
Was ICE merely going after it because it had “Torrent” in the name, or is even providing search results to torrent files now considered copyright infringement? As I said in a podcast I recorded Friday night, “Which means they have to seize Google.” Don’t believe me?
Those sure look like search results linking to illegal files to me. I guess we can expect to see a seizure notice on Google’s site at any time now?
While I am not here to defend the trading of torrents that violate a content creator’s copyright, I am here to say that this particular domain seizure not only makes no sense, it’s kind of scary how they went about it. ICE didn’t even have to involve GoDaddy? ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) can just redirect domains as they see fit? Well, that’s a piece of knowledge I never had before.
TorrentFreak has published a list of all the seized domains, and the majority of them are for counterfeit designer goods, and as these were sites actually selling the goods, we totally get that. But a search engine? Really? Well, enjoy Google while you can folks if that’s the new criteria for a site infringing on copyrights.
What say you? Do you think the U.S. government is going too far?
Disguise your little one with the help of a themed costume
From avocado halves to hoppy bunnies, costumes speak to every child's unique spirit. And we've collected our favorite options.
Add magic to your living space with these string lights
String lights add personality and soft light to your living space. Here are some of the best.
The Galaxy S20 Ultra's Space Zoom camera is amazing and a bit creepy
The Galaxy S20 Ultra supports up to 100X zoom, which Samsung calls Space Zoom, but is it any good? Can a phone really product usable photos at 100x zoom? We've got our Galaxy S20 Ultra already so join us to find out!
Play to your heart's content with the best gaming console on the market
There's a ton of fun gaming consoles you can buy to bring more fun and games into your household. The hard part is deciding which to buy! We have a rundown of the best choices to help you make a decision.