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Porn Virus Blackmails Victims Over "Copyright Violation" 222

Posted by timothy from the or-shall-we-bill-your-wife? dept.
FishRep writes with this excerpt from the BBC: "A new type of malware infects PCs using file-share sites and publishes the user's net history on a public website before demanding a fee for its removal. The Japanese trojan virus installs itself on computers using a popular file-share service called Winni, used by up to 200m people. It targets those downloading illegal copies of games in the Hentai genre, an explicit form of anime. Website Yomiuri claims that 5,500 people have so far admitted to being infected. The virus, known as Kenzero, is being monitored by web security firm Trend Micro in Japan. Masquerading as a game installation screen, it requests the PC owner's personal details. It then takes screengrabs of the user's web history and publishes it online in their name, before sending an e-mail or pop-up screen demanding a credit card payment of 1,500 yen (£10) to 'settle your violation of copyright law' and remove the webpage."
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Porn Virus Blackmails Victims Over "Copyright Violation" More

Porn Virus Blackmails Victims Over "Copyright Violation"

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  • Sounds like a plan (Score:5, Interesting)

    by BadAnalogyGuy ( 945258 ) <BadAnalogyGuy@gmail.com> on Friday April 16, 2010 @04:30AM (#31869262)

    So you call the cops, transfer the money, find out who is on the other end, have the law and credit card agencies come down hard on them.

    Unless you're afraid of getting caught with porn...

    • Re:Sounds like a plan (Score:5, Funny)

      by OrwellianLurker ( 1739950 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @04:32AM (#31869276)

      Unless you're afraid of getting caught with porn...

      If that porn involves schoolgirls getting raped by tentacles, then yes, I would be afraid of getting caught.

      • Re:Sounds like a plan (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Thanshin ( 1188877 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @04:39AM (#31869308)

        If that porn involves schoolgirls getting raped by tentacles, then yes, I would be afraid of getting caught.

        Drawings of schoolgirls getting raped.

        There's quite a difference. Unless you think they abduct actual schoolgirls, and octopuses, to use them as models.

        • Re:Sounds like a plan (Score:4, Insightful)

          by OrwellianLurker ( 1739950 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @04:48AM (#31869342)

          If that porn involves schoolgirls getting raped by tentacles, then yes, I would be afraid of getting caught.

          Drawings of schoolgirls getting raped.

          There's quite a difference. Unless you think they abduct actual schoolgirls, and octopuses, to use them as models.

          I have no problem with the drawings. All I am saying is that if I had that kind of pornography in my web history, I would not want the public to see it attached to my name.

          • Re:Sounds like a plan (Score:5, Insightful)

            by martas ( 1439879 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @05:50AM (#31869632)
            first you'd have to be stupid enough to give your real name to a pirated porn game...

            • first you'd have to be stupid enough to give your real name to a pirated porn game...

              Ahahahahaha !

              Apparently over 5,500 of them are qualified as "stupid enough"

              I don't even use my real name on my New York Time website / Wall Street Journal accounts.

              • Apparently over 5,500 of them are qualified as "stupid enough"

                No, 5,500 people "admitted to being infested". We don't know if that means they reported that infection under their real name, or "admitting they were infected" meant they submitted data about the infection to Trend Micro.

                Like most major news articles of this type, the facts are a little meager, and much of the language vague. It appears to me more of a "In other news..." type of fluff piece about how "crazy that Internet is" than hard reportin

          • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

            by LatencyKills ( 1213908 )
            Won't someone think of the octopi?!?

        • Re:Sounds like a plan (Score:4, Funny)

          by spectrokid ( 660550 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @04:58AM (#31869390) Homepage

          Unless you think they abduct actual schoolgirls, and octopuses, to use them as models.

          How about the calamari I can buy in the fish shop down the street. Will that do?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Trepidity ( 597 )

            I regret to inform you that your Slashdot post, registered as #31869390, is illegal textual pornography.

          • How about the calamari I can buy

            Geez, I need more sleep.

            I misread that Katamari [wikipedia.org].

            If you want a chuckle, try to picture what type of uber-bizzaro PS2 otaku hentai could come from that combination.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Minwee ( 522556 )

              If you want a chuckle, try to picture what type of uber-bizzaro PS2 otaku hentai could come from that combination.

              Or you could just look it up on Google images search. Think of it as Rule 34 Compliance Monitoring.

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward

          This depends on your jurisdiction. Many countries, such as Australia [bbc.co.uk], believe that a real child is abused when someone draws a picture of a child being abused, or something. The new UK Act which came into force earlier this month also criminalises certain depictions by adult actresses, though I'm not sure it goes as far as criminalising hentai... must read up further.

          Anyway, every guy who has browsed porn has at least one pic in his cache/deleted which "might" be underage and for which he has no proof other

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by rjch ( 544288 )

          Drawings of schoolgirls getting raped.

          There's quite a difference. Unless you think they abduct actual schoolgirls, and octopuses, to use them as models.

          Not in Australia [animenewsnetwork.com] there isn't.

          This country seems to be determined to put itself on a fast track to eliminating common sense every bit as quickly as the United States.

          • Re:Sounds like a plan (Score:4, Funny)

            by Kreigaffe ( 765218 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @07:43AM (#31870422)

            Are you kidding? They're way ahead of us. The Australian government has actually taken the stance that unless you have big full breasts, you're not a real woman. I mean, damn. Setting up a whole generation of girls to feel inadequate. Nice.

            • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

              by TheRaven64 ( 641858 )
              For a real laugh, look for publicity photographs of Sen. Conroy, the politician pushing hardest for this law with his wife. Notice anything? Yup, she has quite small breasts meaning, according to the Senator's own words, that anyone attracted to her is a pedophile.

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by Minwee ( 522556 )

          Drawings of schoolgirls getting raped.
          There's quite a difference.

          You might [msn.com] want to tell [statutelaw.gov.uk] a few more people [theregister.co.uk] about that [qt.com.au].

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by thijsh ( 910751 )
        That's the problem with blackmail, it only works if you're uptight about it... I don't give a fuck. I have hentai in my porn collection, my girlfriend and friends know and I even shared it on the LAN at the student dorm (and kept stats that said over 50% of people accessed it)... Hentai is just like masturbation: everyone is doing it but no-one want's to admit it. With the difference that masturbation is a gift for life and hentai is just a thing to check out once in your life. :-)

        Posting non-AC for obvio

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Sique ( 173459 )

          I don't have Hentai, sorry, and I am not into it. Shall I admit accessing Hentai anyway?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by thijsh ( 910751 )
            Sure why not. I'm also not *into* hentai, not by a long shot... But I am not afraid to admit what most people have done (or will do) at least once in their life. I want to bet that in the near future will look back at hentai as the childish sexual cartoons they are and say 'was this what all the fuss was all about?'.

      • Re:Sounds like a plan (Score:5, Funny)

        by Edmund Blackadder ( 559735 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @04:57AM (#31869380)

        When will we grow beyond these terrible false negative stereotypes of the fine ancient tradition tentacle porn?

        In the more refined examples of tentacle art (as this is its proper name), the school girls are graduate school girls and the tentacle monsters take the girls to dinner and drinks and spend many hours making clever observational comments in trendy downtown winebars before they even brave to invite them to their lair. And even then they fumble nervously around with their tentacles for at least an hour before the exasperated girl finally says that she is really tired from writing her thesis and if she could be brutally violated simultaneously in all possible ways with enormous tentacles, that would really be a change of pace.

    • I think most people who frequent this site would be more embarrassed about getting that virus.

  • The MAFIAA (Score:5, Funny)

    by OrwellianLurker ( 1739950 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @04:31AM (#31869268)
    The MAFIAA must be wondering why they haven't done this yet. "Why waste time in the courts guys? Why lobby politicians?"
  • As the RIAA and the MPAA have shown in the past decade it's a perfectly legal way of doing business to threaten and blackmail people with the content they have downloaded. It's just that 10 dollars is very amateuristic. You should start with thousands of dollars for each item downloaded. 10 dollars almost seems like a realistic amount if the RIAA had a website saying: You, PjotrP, have downloaded a song by one of the artists we represent and for 10$ we will forget about it.
    • I know that was the only part that shocked me - $10 seems like such a tiny amount, it's like the authors are betting most people will just do it instead of invesitgating.

      • I know that was the only part that shocked me - $10 seems like such a tiny amount, it's like the authors are betting most people will just do it instead of invesitgating.

        That and depending on where the scammers are based that $10 may be worth a lot more than $10 would buy where you are. An amount small enough that the victims don't care enough not to pay but large enough to be worth something at the perp's end doesn't make bad sense.

        Of course, what is to say that it will stop there? Once they have the $10 maybe a new page will go up with a little more detail possibly including the fact that they paid money to try keep it all quiet and a demand for $100. Once you've got some

      • Perhaps it's priced to avoid some minimum threashold for a charge of blackmail. There are lots of perfectly legitimate bussinesse that set their prices simply to avoid legal recourse. Here in Oz the minimum claim in the small claims court is $50 so a lot of TV specials are priced at $49.95, also a lot of used cars are priced at $4995 to avoid mandatory warranty obligations that kick in at $5K.
    • £10 is not 10 dollars. It is "somewhat" more, I'm afraid. It's probably about £10 more in the current economic situation...

    • Have you seen the number of popups Pr0n pages spawn? Perhaps you mean $10 (YourCurrencyMayVary) per popup!

    • And to that, my reply would be

      "Yes, I certainly downloaded (song|movies|book|other copyrighted material). I did not make it available, or otherwise violate your Copyright. Go away and find the person who DID violate your Copyright. I was under the impression that the copy was fully sanctioned by you. Prosecuting me for Copyright infringement will be as effective as pounding sand."

      Please don't spread the meme that "Downloading is Copyright Infringement". It isn't. Uploading may be. Simply, everything is Copy

  • Winny? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by EdZ ( 755139 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @05:29AM (#31869520)
    Serves them right for using an ancient system (two generations behind, PD (Perfect Dark) via Share). This is like someone still using, say, Kazaa, and being surprised there are fake files.

  • Wonderful reporting courtesy of the BBC (Score:5, Informative)

    by onlysolution ( 941392 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @05:41AM (#31869592)
    I think it's worth pointing that Winni is used almost exclusively by the Japanese, and the total population of Japan is still under 130 million people. The 200 million users figure put forth by the BBC is a bad guess at best, and completely made up at worst. I honestly expected better from the BBS, but why should factual reporting get in the way of writing a sensational story?

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward

      And I get a kick out of things like this popping up when I keep having to hear from japaenese about how viruses/malware is a foreigner-only thing the same way copyright infringement is a foreigner-only thing. So this kind of thing is like a double slap in their face. :)

      Not that they'd ever let themselves believe a single japanese person was involved in any of this.

    • The 200 million number is probably the number of accounts, not real people. I'd venture a guess that there are simply some enthusiasts who just have more than one account ;-)
    • "I honestly expected better from the BBS"

      Can't quite put my finger on the joke but I'm thinking; Murdoch, budget cuts, dinosours....

      But seriously TFA states "used by up to 200m people". The key phrase being "up to" meaning they couldn't find accurate stats on unique users.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Z34107 ( 925136 )

      As you said, the BBC claims 200 million Japanese Winny users, relative to the island nation's entire population of 130 million.

      It's also romanized "Winny," but again they couldn't be bothered to Google.

      Sadly, Sankaku Complex [sankakucomplex.com] (NSFW!) has better reporting than the BBC.

      Evidently, the most "famous" victim so far was a teacher downloading child porn and warez on school computers. Even sadder than the BBC's reporting, he's so far kept his job.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tnk1 ( 899206 )

      They are including the population of the Greater Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere in their calculation.

  • I couldn't help but think... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by augi01 ( 1209002 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @06:00AM (#31869692)
    Why would an individual care if his or her browsing history is published online? Employers search for Facebook or MySpace pages because these websites contain 'proof' that you behaved in some way or other (e.g. pictures), but a browsing history does not tell them anything other than, 'a computer in my household has accessed these websites at some point in time or other,' which can easily be accounted for by explaining that a friend pranked your machine with tentacle porn or your children were just really excited about Misty and Ash Ketchum.

    But perhaps the real emphasis is on the following, from TFA:

    A fictitious organization calling itself the ICPP copyright foundation issues threatening pop-ups and letters after a virus searches the computer hard drive for illegal content - regardless of whether it actually finds anything. It offers a "pretrial settlement" fine of $400 (£258) payable by credit card, and warns of costly court cases and even jail sentences if the victim ignores the notice.

    If an individual knows that they have illegal content on their HDD they might opt for this $400.00 settlement, as past copyright infringement suits have cost individuals hefty sums.

  • Public Website? (Score:4, Informative)

    by pgn674 ( 995941 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @06:37AM (#31869878) Homepage
    For this to be effective, either the website needs to be highly publicized, or the user needs to be stupid or in a panic. I can't image the web site can be publicly known for long; virus maintainers have a hard enough time keeping their private servers up and connectable. I wonder how the virus convinces the user that their private history will be available for peruse by their friends/coworkers/family?

    Symantec has some information on the virus: HTTP Infostealer Kenzero Activity: Attack Signature - Symantec Corp. [symantec.com]

  • but this is the first virus i ever actually rooted for

    what a demented, hilarious scheme

  • It doesn't publish your name and details (Score:3, Interesting)

    by petes_PoV ( 912422 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @07:24AM (#31870222)
    ... it publishes the name and details that you enter in it's registration form.

    This sounds to me like a possible double-blackmail, where a person deliberately downloads this trojan, enters the personal details of someone they dislike, or wish to extract money from, or wants to get fired and threatens or actually hits . Off goes the personal info, plus whatever you've seeded that machine's surfing history with.

    The obvious third phase is then fro the victim to sue the publishing website for defamation, since you (the blackmailer) never entered that information and have been misrepresented by the false information they've published. Sounds like everybody wins!

    • If you registered it with bug me not email, and used some random name, you most likely will never care about the threat. Isn't that the way many people register games?

  • Clearly this is a derivative work of their copyrighted sketch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZgwNutwK0Y [youtube.com]

  • How long before Virus start useing the DMCA to stop anti virus apps?

    I can see some of the fake anti virus one useing that and some of the spyware out there.

  • Why stop here? Why not just download ( hidden ) child porn ( or god forbid, music ) onto the PC and threaten that if you don't pay up you will be reported. Forget the 'public shaming', lets go hardcore, and then perhaps we can get this stuff stopped.

  • Trying to make it sound like it uses winni to magically infect your pc.. It wasn't p2p, it was the user that didn't scan/etc. Typical mis information.

  • I'm surprised this hasn't happened sooner. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by log0n ( 18224 ) on Friday April 16, 2010 @09:54PM (#31880002)

    What with our puritanical (US) society and all.. blackmail husbands to keep their pr0n habits away from wives, non-catholic clergy against the church, teachers, lawyers, etc.

    Doesn't even need to be illegal porn.. just porn in general. How many people dread a significant other finding out what really gets them off?

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