Movie Download Service Sued Over Spyware
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Movieland.com is the second company to be sued under Washington's spyware law.
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(InfoWorld) - A California attorney claims he has unraveled part of the mystery behind a questionable software program and is prepared to go to court. Attorney Joseph M. Bochner filed a class-action civil suit last September in California Superior Court in Santa Clara County against two men the suit alleges are behind Winfixer, a purported security software. The lawsuit names Marc J. Cohen of Florida, and was amended last week to add James Reno of Ohio as an additional defendant, Bochner said. It seeks compensation and a halt to the distribution of Winfixer, among other remedies. The suit was filed on behalf of Beatrice Ochoa, a mother of two who paid US$39.95 for Winfixer after it badgered her with repeated pop-up warnings that her computer had security threats. The program eventually rendered her computer's hard drive unusable, Bochner said. The suit counts another 100 anonymous victims. "All of these people are being defrauded and they're just ordinary folks," Bochner said. "They buy a computer, they surf the Internet, they're not doing anything unreasonable and suddenly they're defrauded." Indecision over whether Winfixer is a legitimate product may be the reason it still pervades the Internet. Winfixer has been a moving target for security experts, at times going by the names ErrorSafe, WinAntiSpyware, WinAntiVirus, SystemDoctor and DriveCleaner. Security software from vendors such as Sophos PLC and Symantec Corp. will detect it, but give users the option of whether they want to remove it. Sophos calls it "adware" that hypes security threats and then implores users to buy the software. Microsoft Corp., however, pulled no punches last month whenÂ Winfixer ads began show up on its instant-messaging program, calling it "malware," a shorter term for "malicious software." Experts have also seen it install itself on computers via security vulnerabilities in browsers or OSes. However, the lawsuit could face hurdles in court. Web sites are frequently registered under false names or under stolen identifies and the real owners can be difficult to trace, said Sandi Hardmeier, a computer security authority who writes about Winfixer on her blog "Spyware Sucks." Proving the link to the alleged perpetrators, their connections to Winfixer all the way through to the effects on Ochoa's computer will be very difficult, she said. "Forensics is everything," she said. Bochner acknowledges it's hard work to track down fraudsters who use the Internet's anonymity to commit crimes, but the criminals are real people who can be located. Bochner said he has compelling documentation to link the defendants named in the suit to Winfixer. By researching IP (Internet Protocol) addresses that hosted the versions of Winfixer and their owners, Bochner alleges he has uncovered a fraud based in the U.S. that has escaped law enforcement scrutiny. Reno ran a Web hosting company called ByteHosting Internet Service LLC with a postal address in Amelia, Ohio. Bochner said at one time, a support number for Winfixer support also rang through to ByteHosting, which led in part to Reno being added to the suit. Reno, along with other co-defendants and ByteHosting, was sued by Symantec Corp. in 2004 for allegedly creating pop-up ads that told consumers their Symantec software was about to expire. The ads then directed users to fake software that looked similar to Symantec products. Court records show Reno and Symantec reached a confidential settlement in December 2004. Cohen was named for his connections with vipfares.com, a now-defunct travel Web site, Bochner said. At one time, the Winfixer software would hijack the user's browser and suddenly show vipfares.com, he said. Efforts to reach Cohen and Reno for comment were unsuccessful on Wednesday and Thursday. However, Cohen's attorney, Judy Silverstein, appeared on a San Francisco TV news program on Feb. 26 regarding Winfixer and her client. Silverstein said, "His [Cohen's] position is he's done nothing wrong. He's done nothing improper or illegal, and he's had no ownership interested in those Web sites." Bochner said he has turned over some of his research to law enforcement agencies such as the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and Secret Service along with California authorities. While researching IP addresses that linked to Winfixer, Bochner said he suddenly came upon a database detailing sales of Winfixer and the other versions of the programs. The multi-gigabyte database -- apparently left unsecured and open to the Internet -- contained names, addresses, credit-card numbers, transaction amounts and the version of Winfixer that was sold, he said. For example, on Jan. 20, 2006, the data showed 2,351 sales to users worldwide, with an average transaction amount of $40, Bochner said. The database covers transactions made from January 2005 through January 2006. One of the records shows a transaction made by someone who lives across the street from his law office, Bochner said. The data, while incomplete, allows a view of the fraud ring's broad reach and scope, he said. "I think this is far larger than anyone has ever expected," Bochner said. "It's not inconceivable that these people have made $150 million or more over the last few years." Â
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Hollywood movie studios, through the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), have today sued scores of operators of computer servers that help relay digitised movie files across online file-sharing networks.
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By Eric Benderoff, Chicago Tribune  Sep. 7--A federal lawsuit that pitted a Naperville attorney who wanted to bring class-action status against a company he says puts spyware on personal computers was dismissed Wednesday before reaching trial.
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December 15, 2004 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- According to reports release on Tuesday Hollywood movies studios sued numerous operators of computer servers that help transfer digital movie files across online file-sharing networks.
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Hollywood sues hundreds of files sharers and hobbles hardware in war on piracy.
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Slammed for touting unavailable but unlicensed content
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The Motion Picture Association of America has begun filing lawsuits nationwide against people who swap illegally copied movies over the Internet via file-sharing applications such as KaZaA, eDonkey and Grokster.
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The PCs of thrifty shoppers who use a discount service get littered with deceptively named tracking files that most people would be afraid to delete, according to a crusading anti-spyware professor.
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Hollywood film studios filed suit against online video file swappers in federal courts across the United States on Tuesday, making good on a promise to punish computer users they claim are violating copyright laws.
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The Motion Picture Association of America has filed complaints in federal court against individuals accused of sharing pirated copies of films on the Internet.
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The Federal Trade Commission on Thursday filed the first case in the country against software companies accused of infecting computers with intrusive &quot;spyware
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The Motion Picture Association of  America said on Wednesday it has sued a company that sells  Internet downloads of current movies like "I, Robot" and  "Spider-Man 2" without permission.
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The much-maligned copy protection program that Sony BMG Music Entertainment put on CDs last year is still posing a threat to computer users running certain versions of AOL or PestPatrol anti-spyware software.
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WASHINGTON - In what regulators are calling a first, the government has asked for a court order to shut down a spyware operation.    The Federal Trade Commission says computer users who went to certain Web sites unknowingly had the snooping software downloaded onto their computers...
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Damages of up to $30,000 (Â£16,300) per film are being sought by the Motion Picture Association of America in an unknown number of lawsuits filed against people caught illegally downloading digital copies of films.
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Two more distributors of allegedly -- if not obviously -- unlicensed content are facing civil prosecution by the Motion Picture Association of America this afternoon. YouTVpc and Peekvid are the subjects of civil suits in US District Court in Los Angeles, not only for hosting unlicensed content but linking to other sources for unlicensed content as well.