‘ Bad P2P ’

Tracker’s Invites Being Offered Through Facebook = Facepalm

February 02, 10 by sharky   6,641  views  

Today, FSF received what could be interpreted as an alarming email; one private tracker in particular is offering the opportunity for Facebook members to request invites through their tracker’s official Facebook page. At first glance this plan seemed innovative & unique - but is all this really a good idea? Our hunch is that it’s probably not in anyone’s best interest to connect a Facebook account to a private tracker. But what do we know? Reader feedback on this is encouraged, but we’ll outline some key points.

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Vizz.tv Selling Access, Accounts to New TV Tracker

October 02, 09 by sharky   5,608  views  

Well, there’s P2L and then there’s this. The creators of Bitt.tv have shut down the site due to lack of donations in favor of a different model that charges $24 USD for a yearly subscription to their new ratio-free TV tracker at http://vizz.tv. So instead of running a top-notch torrent tracker (which they obviously failed at) where members will gladly donate, why not charge a one-time flat fee just so members can gain entrance? - without even offering a single iota of detail about what’s behind the $24 curtain. Talk about taking the ‘free’ out of BitTorrent - here’s the message staff sent out today to existing members of Bitt.tv:

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How to Promote Your New Tracker: Just Buy eMail Addresses From Others

July 24, 09 by sharky   5,469  views  

"Where did my invite come from?" You signed up for a private tracker using a valid email address, and got invited to a different one - out of the blue. Sounds cool? Think again. While the prospect of getting into a new tracker "no strings attached" may seem convenient, the scenario is actually quite scary: where did they get your email address from? Should you dismiss it as some some phishing scam designed to steal your name/password to use on your elite sites, or is your email address on a "for sale" list? Probably the latter.

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Why You Shouldn’t Trade - Staff, Members Face Ban

March 28, 09 by sharky   8,697  views  

If you’re an invite trader, you may find yourself on the business end of the banhammer on popular torrent forums and private trackers alike. Well known for being an invite trading forum - which doesn’t bode well with private trackers - Swedish-based torrentinvites.se staff and members now have a lot more to worry about with the recent alliance between certain torrent discussion boards and popular trackers - in a bold crackdown bid to oust traders from the scene.

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Ratio Faker: Your New Best Friend To Get Tracker Banned

March 12, 09 by sharky   16,883  views  

Private tracker sysops & admins may have a brand-new headache on their hands with Ratio Faker. Self praising, "Ratio Faker can help you keep a good ratio in private bittorrent trackers." Actually, Ratio Faker is a new third-party utility that can (and probably will) assist you in getting banned from your favorite private trackers. It works through your existing BitTorrent client by reporting inaccurate upload and download stats to the tracker, thus boosting your ratio. Hey, at the very least you’ll go out with a good ratio, before finding yourself unable to login.

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Discordia Takes Over ‘Lphant’ P2P Domain; Now Owns Shareaza, BearShare, Lphant & iMesh.com

March 05, 09 by sharky   10,310  views  

Anti-P2P group Discordia Ltd., who made headlines in late 2007 with the controversial commandeering of Shareaza’s official domain, has now surreptitiously acquired Lphant. Discordia began with takeovers of BearShare.com & iMesh.com - and most notably Shareaza.com - evidently their slick tactics are again at work with the recent acquisition of Lphant.com.

While the Lphant peer-to-peer program was never a well-known client among giants such as BearShare, Shareaza and even iMesh - but by right it certainly has (or had) it’s own userbase. Obviously this conquest comes at little cost to Discordia for a domain of such little importance nowadays; perhaps the point is irrelevant. For years now, peer-to-peer users have been shying away from these all-in-one applications in favor of a more efficient, trustworthy distributed network known as BitTorrent.

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Private Tracker Invites For Sale at TorrentInvites.org

December 17, 08 by sharky   8,386  views  

If it were April 1st, we’d put a lot more scrutiny into what we’re about to report. It would appear that TorrentInvites.org is selling private tracker invites. Just in time for Christmas, you can now purchase your very own favorite private tracker, for you or a loved one. And some of them are even on sale; such as What.cd which is going for $9.95 USD. Ironically, that’s much less painful than waiting to take their IRC invite quiz.

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Demonoid Users Beware - Be Careful What You Download

September 27, 08 by sharky   15,717  views  

As a rule, private trackers are more secure than public ones. However, what many members of Demonoid don’t realize is that most of the popular torrents are using public trackers - which is just about everything that has a huge swarm of seeders & leechers. Thus, you may as well just be downloading from ThePirateBay or Mininova; essentially it’s the same thing. So why is it that Demonoid users are shocked when they receive nasty eletters from their ISPs admonishing them for downloading copyrighted content? That’s exactly what’s happening, and the complaints are rolling in on many of the torrents.

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Public Torrent Users Beware: The Next-gen Torrent Scam

August 30, 08 by sharky   8,656  views  

Unless you happened to be fortunate enough to start out on BitTorrent through the great world of private trackers, you’ve probably fallen for some pretty intricate public torrent scams in your time. And let’s face it - we’ve all been duped into downloading password-protected torrents, only to have to click on external links to find that elusive password on sites that we just shouldn’t need to be visiting. Some of us may have been forced to acquire a special media player (such as DOM) to play that movie you just spent three days downloading. But all of this is child’s play compared to the new generation of torrent scams.

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Private Trackers For Sale on eBay? What’s Next?

July 22, 08 by sharky   7,001  views  

From Shill Bidders to fake Feedback Ratings, fraudulent listings and hijacked accounts, eBay has always been a haven for scammers. So maybe that’s why we’re not surprised to see prominent BitTorrent trackers up for bid there.

Yes, folks - for only $0.99 USD you can bid on an invite to What.cd, STMusic.org and even Torrent-Damage. And shipping is included! Got a little more to part with? Why not scoop up TL for $25?

We personally like this What.cd seller’s ‘disclaimer’ to eBay, to justify his actions:

"Note to ebay: I hold an account on this website and possess this invite, this is my PERSONALLY owned invitation that I may choose to use either way I please I donated to what.cd to obtain this invitation so i hold all grounds to do what ever i wish this is in accordance with this the listing should not be removed. Thank you for your understanding."

We Call Bullshit: If What.cd finds out who you are, you and your entire invite tree will be disabled permanently.

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