Hiding IP address while using uTorrent

[tubulargard]

Hi , Im new to theres forums and am not sure if this toppic has come up before but i was wondering if there is a way of hiding your IP address while using utorrent?

I was downloading a game using utorrent and was busted by the Electronic software assosiation. This is the email i recieved.

COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA

Copyright Regulations 1969

NOTICE OF CLAIMED INFRINGEMENT OF COPYRIGHT BY COPYRIGHT OWNER OR AGENT

- STORAGE, CACHING, OR REFERRAL TO INFRINGING COPYRIGHT MATERIAL

ESA Reference Number:

TO Westnet Pty Ltd:

1. I, on behalf of the Entertainment Software Association (ESA),

issue this notice for the purposes of item 1, condition 3 of item 3, and

condition 3 of item 4 of the table in subsection 116AH(1) of the

Copyright Act 1968 and regulation 20I of the Copyright Regulations 1969.

2. ESA is the agent of the owner of the copyright in the copyright

material specified in the below Schedule (i.e., game product that is

protected by Australian intellectual property law), that is being

infringed by material residing on your system or network, cached on your

system or network, or referred or linked to by your system or network. 3. I believe, in good faith, that the storage, caching, linking, or

referral of/to the infringing copyright material on your system or

network is not authorised by the copyright owner or a licensee of the

copyright owner, or the Copyright Act 1968, and is therefore an

infringement of the copyright in that material.

4. I have taken reasonable steps to ensure that the information and

statements in this notice are accurate.

NAME OF AGENT OF OWNER: Entertainment Software Association

ADDRESS: 575 7th Street, NW, Suite 300, Washington, DC 20004 USA

Intellectual Property Enforcement

Entertainment Software Association

(Agent of owner)

TELEPHONE NUMBER: (1) 202-223-2400

FAX NUMBER: (1) 202 223 2401

E-MAIL ADDRESS:

mailto:esa@copyright-compliance.com?subject=RE%3A%20Notice%20ID%3A%20182

%2D47008252%20ESA%20Australia%20Notice

SCHEDULE

DESCRIPTION OF COPYRIGHT MATERIAL: Based on the information at its

disposal on the 14 Jul 2008 01:27:35 GMT, ESA has a good faith belief

that *IP ADDRESS** infringes the rights of one or more ESA members by

offering for sale or download unauthorized copies of game products

protected by copyright. The copyrighted works that have been infringed

include but are not limited to:

Title: Resident Evil

Infringement Source: BitTorrent

Infringement Timestamp: 14 Jul 2008 01:27:35 GMT

Infringement Last Documented: 14 Jul 2008 01:27:35 GMT

Infringer Username: Infringing Filename: Resident evil 4.7z

Infringing Filesize: 1441523214

Infringer IP Address: (_______________)

Infringer DNS Name: **IP INFO****

Infringing URL: http://torrent-downloads.to:5869/announce

LOCATION OF COPYRIGHT MATERIAL RESIDING ON CARRIAGE SERVICE PROVIDER'S

SYSTEM: The unauthorized copies of such game product(s) appears on or

is made available through ***IP INFO** Those items are listed

and/or identified thereon by their titles or variations thereof,

game-related listings/references/descriptions, or depictions of

game-related artwork. Such copies, titles, game-related

listings/references/descriptions, and depictions are hereinafter

referred to as "Infringing Material."

ACTION REQUESTED: In light of the infringing material described herein,

ESA hereby requests Westnet Pty Ltd to immediately do the following:

1. Notify the account holder of the Infringing Material.

2. Remove, or disable access to, the Infringing Material detailed

above.

3. Take appropriate action against the account holder under your

Abuse Policy/Terms of Service Agreement, including termination of a repeat

offender.

- ---Start ACNS XML

Since recieving this email i have been a little unsure about using and torrents B( Is it safe to download movies or should i keep clear of it altogother ? now that they have my ip address on record would they be tracking everthing i do concerning torrents?

Can any one give me and special advise please ??

Gard

[Switeck]

Your ISP is merely forwarding a letter on to you that THEY received from a copyright-monitoring company that scans torrents.

Your ISP is almost certainly not monitoring your torrenting.

Receiving 1 letter does not make you more or less likely in receiving another, however continued activity on any torrents likely to be monitored (such as latest TV shows, movies, or music albums) will draw immediate attention.

uTorrent and all BitTorrent clients find and track each others ip addresses. They need that information to function...and it is exactly that information that a copyright-monitoring company gathers. It wouldn't matter if BitTorrent clients didn't show ip addresses in their interfaces...because those details are still passed down the wire in a "readable" format.

Even running uTorrent through a proxy server is not reliable protection, because the proxy server may be forced to give up your personal information if it is a paid service in "friendly" countries...or may even be a hostile "honeytrap" proxy hosted by the very copyright-monitoring companies that scan torrents! Barring that, a standard proxy connection is not encrypted in-and-of itself, so someone monitoring your connection locally or at any point that your communication traffic passes through can gather all kinds of details. An encrypted virtual private network (VPN for short) will protect against "man-in-the-middle" style monitoring attacks, but if for any reason the VPN goes down, uTorrent may try to make direct connections in the clear. Even if the VPN never goes offline and you never lose connection to the VPN, your "bare" internet ip may still be passed on to the other peers, seeds, and trackers of the torrents you're on due to potential software glitches. (uTorrent probably won't do this except due to VPN failures, but others might.) Lastly, good VPNs which are less likely to go down and have high bandwidth tend to be as expensive as your monthly ISP costs.

Using even a "perfect" ip blocklist to block hostile ip ranges is not sufficient, because copyright-monitoring companies don't need to CONNECT to you to get your ip from other peers, seeds, or trackers. They don't really need solid proof you're actually on the torrent/s they're monitoring to harass your ISP and threating you with copyright violation fines.

In short, you have no protection currently and any protection you could add is likely minimal or expensive or both.

[tubulargard]

Thanks for the fast reply this has cleared a few things up for me .

[Dark Shroud]

The only thing you really can do is make sure you have a good firewall running. Zone Alarm is not a good firewall, use either Windows or Comodo.

[tubulargard]

I didn't know a firewall could make anydifference ? At the moment i only use the one that comes with wondows Vista .

[Dark Shroud]

All the firewall does is keep those companies from illegally accessing your PC. As I said it's illegal, but they'll do it anyway if they can. The Windows one is good enough for average use.

[Chryss]

Any point to using vpn capabilities in one's router (forgive me if it's a silly question, far from a networking guru)

[Switeck]

A firewall will have no effect against these companies. They're not accessing your computer outside of the normal BitTorrent traffic...they're just acting exactly like regular seeds and peers -- they're recording the information as they go.

It's even more useless than large ip blocklists...which as I already said doesn't prevent these companies from gathering your ip from a torrent tracker or even other peers/seeds on the same torrents.

At the most, being firewalled relative whatever ip the monitoring companies are using will prevent them from connecting to your computer. But some have been shown to send out Cease and Desist notices to ISPs and people without ever connecting to the ips in question to verify that the ips ARE sharing torrents:

http://dmca.cs.washington.edu/

The VPN capabilities in your router are ONLY good if you're connecting to a remote VPN point and running your torrents through there...AND the remote VPN point won't report your real ip if threatened with Cease and Desist notices from monitoring companies.

[Dark Shroud]

Switeck, in many of the early cases the "detectives" working for the RIAA actually did access the people's computers beyond just BitTorrent to see what they had on their PC. It was obviously illegal as hell but they did do it. I don't believe they try it anymore. But it's still required to have at least the Windows firewall running in this day & age to avoid mass infection.

[homestarrunner]

I appreciate your concern, but isn't it against the forum rules to post questions regarding the downloading of illegal media?

[Switeck]

krytie75, yeah it is...I'm just too lazy to edit the first person's post.

He needs to do that himself.

The post is subject to immediate deletion of moderators feel so inclined.

But it is better to leave it up as a warning and that is why I am adding about "they CAN catch you, you CAN'T effectively hide!"

Dark Shroud,

A firewall or router with only uTorrent's listening port forwarded is an absolute must for connecting to the internet. So much so that I thought you meant "software firewall in addition to a router", which is why I responded. But either way, it would probably be "beneficial" to someone accused of copyright violations if they could show that "detectives" illegally accessed their computers. Doubly so if they were completely innocent.

[parhan]

How do I set up the windows firewall so utorrent only works when I am connected through vpn, stops when vpn connection does not work.

[catmando]

uses this tool

http://vpnetmon.webs.com/

[RufiO_o]

all signs seem to point to a vpn like ivacy being a good idea for most anyone. however, i was wondering if anyone could speak to the effectiveness that vpn's such as this would be providing. given that you are using that vpn, utorrent, and that last mentioned tool incase that vpn goes down...

since obviously i would imagine that the sites would say everything is hunky dorry, but is what they provide offering that much more protection. what vpn might anyone know of, ivacy or something else that might be completely reliable and effective if i ever felt the need to take that route. granted there may be a question in that itself, about how effectively such a measure shields you from anyone's eyes.

thanks.

[ktetch]

Switeck, in many of the early cases the "detectives" working for the RIAA actually did access the people's computers beyond just BitTorrent to see what they had on their PC. It was obviously illegal as hell but they did do it. I don't believe they try it anymore. But it's still required to have at least the Windows firewall running in this day & age to avoid mass infection.

Sorry, but whoever told you this was talking out their ass. It never happened. It's another of those many urban myths on this topic.

[Ruathaz]

There is 3 ways avoid their detection.

1. Having a computer in some other country to download the torrent and then directly download it to you.

(This is highly unlikely and the least feasible option)

2. Move. Yes move to another country where there isn't copyright infringement.

(My suggestion is where ever thepiratebay server is located now. They have been kicked out of MANY countries)

3. Don't do it. Stop hurting the programmers who make these games for your enjoyment. They work long hard hours and deserve what little they make.

(most feasible option)

[seattlelion]

I have seen and read answers like this before where Ruathaz says in his remarks here: 3. Don't do it. Stop hurting the programmers who make these games for your enjoyment. They work long hard hours and deserve what little they make. (most feasible option)

Doesn't that look and sound hypocritical to you?

It sure does to me because for one, what is this person doing in this forum that obviously leads back to downloading illegal software through these torrent websites onto our computers and then has the nerve to speak out do the right thing and buy these games people share with one another online.

Right verses Wrong---Wrong verses Right and hypocracy makes me want to puke

[FredSam43]

It sure does to me because for one, what is this person doing in this forum that obviously leads back to downloading illegal software through these torrent websites onto our computers and then has the nerve to speak out do the right thing and buy these games people share with one another online.

Right verses Wrong---Wrong verses Right and hypocracy makes me want to puke

I'm not sure I understand what you are saying: I use uTorrent and I NEVER download software with it (in fact it seems stupid to me to trust any such downloaded software). No hypocrisy here. IMO anyone who pirates software or music or ... (at least here in the US) is WRONG, no excuses.

[seattlelion]

FredSam43

If you don't download software with the utorrent downloader, what use is it? It's a downloader for torrent websites.

[FredSam43]

If you don't download software with the utorrent downloader, what use is it? It's a downloader for torrent websites.

No, it's a peer to peer file sharing client, no torrent website needed. There's a lot of wonderful stuff out there that's available via torrent: e.g. http://www.ted.com which even is available as the TED applet in uTorrent.

[Sharkyman]

A trusted encrypted VPN-tunnel is enough protection. Period.

What´s all this BS about "at the moment nothing is safe"? If the the VPN company administrating the servers is not saving loggs, use encryption (any encryption for that matter) and you use uTorrent, it's pretty much impossible for you to get caught.

For additional protection from governments, girlfriends and the like encrypt your hard rive using TrueCrypt (a free encrypting app).

If you use a good proxy and encrypt your hard drive you are 100% safe.

EDIT: Lol, this thread is 3 years old, didn't notice that when I read the answers. AND ofc the mere presence of a cryptboot or a torrentclient may be enough to render sever punishments in some countries! (provided they get hold of your hardware)

[sillyfellow]

* You can try to use any proxy or IP hider software to hide your real IP. A proxy server could hide your real IP with a masked IP.

* Though they may have your IP on their records. They can't do anything with it. If you are having a dynamic IP, just reset your modem and your IP will also be changed. All they can do with your IP address is just track your basic geographical location. To make it clear, You can visit any IP lookup site like http://www.ip-details.com/ to know what can an IP address reveal.