Public Torrent Users Beware: The Next-gen Torrent Scam

August 30, 2008 by sharky

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.

Get Updated DVD R1, R5 Movie Release Dates

August 30, 2008 by sharky

Looking for updated information for when the next big movie is going to hit BitTorrent? A brand-new blog has been launched that tracks the upcoming release dates for DVD R1’s (Region Code 1 - North America - DVDRiP/DVDR) and R5’s (Region Code 5 - Russia - with English ‘line’ audio). Not only that, but TV shows and games (PC & Console) are also listed.

Web-Based Torrent Solutions & Services

August 27, 2008 by sharky

Here’s a few of the available web-based Torrent solutions for BT users who are just too lazy to download uTorrent. Or can’t. Or aren’t allowed. These services offer a client-less downloading approach to BitTorrent, which arguably may turn out to be safer than conventional methods.

Metallica’s ‘Death Magnetic’ - A Highly Anticipated Torrent

August 26, 2008 by sharky

Metallica has long been recognized as the poster band against P2P filesharing. Not many will argue that it was in their decision to sue Napster some 8+ years ago is what brought it all to a crashing halt. (It would have happened anyways, due to the centralized architecture of the Napster network). But what remains clear is that Lars Ulrich and company have actively pressed on to keep their music out of P2P, albeit in a futile - almost comical - effort. Enter the new album: Death Magnetic.

Browse Torrents Anonymously at Mass-Torrent.com

August 25, 2008 by sharky

Restrictions brought on by your ISP or network (workplace, school or global location) may result in the inability to surf certain torrent sites. Perhaps your IP address has been banned by a tracker (and the website) for inappropriate behavior. Or maybe you’d just feel much safer being anonymous while surfing torrent sites. Bypassing all this is simple enough - just visit an anonymous web proxy (or CGI proxy) such as anonymouse.org, type in the URL and start torrenting. But if you’re a heavy torrent user you may find this to be a major hassle.

Mass-Torrent.com solves this by incorporating a torrent site search paralleled with anonymous browsing. What makes this service unique is that all searching is conducted through the Mass Torrent Proxy, but the results are displayed through an anonymized webpage of the actual torrent site. And it’s fast, too! Unlike most public web proxy services, you probably won’t even notice a difference in pageload times.

Get A Free Seedbox - Here’s How (Updated)

August 23, 2008 by sharky

UPDATE — With all of these new mini TFlux seedboxes that opened up in the last 24 hours, it appears as though we’ve inadvertently DDoS’ed them. They managed to recover today, but are now keeping a keen eye on the traffic throughput. Old TFlux ’servers’ will no longer work, although you’ll be able to sign up for a new one now; except that it will only work for a few minutes (at best) before being shut down if you opt to install high-traffic torrent clients. There’s still no verdict whether or not GUI-less rTorrent will work as a BT client, but if I were a betting man, I’ve have to say ‘no’.

It’s recently been brought to our attention that there is a company that’s currently offering a free promotion / beta trial that includes a small share of a virtualized server (VPS). More importantly, it’s been discovered that TorrentFlux can be installed on it, thanks largely in part that ‘root access’ is available. Thus, anyone who signs up can run a TorrentFlux seedbox on it, completely free! Be advised that this is a Linux server (not Windows) so you’ll require some basic concept of how SSH and command lines work (although we explain it in depth, so you should be able to follow it).

I’ve tested this with TorrentFlux 2.3, and it works marvelously. After installing TFlux, your "share" of the server will only be 4.92 GB - still large enough to do some serious seeding, and there’s no transfer, bandwidth or torrent limits - and best of all, it’s free! Here’s how:

SyncTheBits - A New Mobile Appz Tracker

August 20, 2008 by sharky

StB, or SynctheBits, is a brand-new niche tracker orientated for mobile contents, consisting of themes, games & applications for popular mobile platforms (Windows Mobile, iPhone, Symbian, BlackBerry and Java). Here’s the pitch from the staff:

Heading Back to the Dorm? Here’s how to Keep Torrenting

August 19, 2008 by sharky

For students, September can be a very stressful time of year - saying goodbye to loved-ones, readjusting to an academic schedule, and the loss of carefree BitTorrent downloading due to an iron-fisted university ISP. While we can’t help you with the first two - at least you’ll be able to keep the torrents rolling into your dorm room by implementing a few of these tips.

Many universities are getting wise to the increasing BitTorrent/P2P traffic that’s clogging up their lines, not to mention the headaches of having to deal with "Copyright Infringement / DMCA" notices to pass along to students. More and more are now using outsourced unfriendly ISP’s that outright ban BitTorrent/P2P traffic, and even FTP access is beginning to join the banlist. If you picked up some nice private trackers over the summer, you’ll have a difficult time keeping active accounts when you can’t download (or seed) torrents.

Here’s how to keep it all in sync:

The New P2P IRC Network - P2P-NET.EU

August 17, 2008 by sharky

For the past 5 years irc.p2p-network.net has been dominating the IRC P2P scene, and no one has taken the step to try and compete… until now. Introducing irc.p2p-net.eu - the latest P2P IRC network. Originally P2P-NET.eu was irc.TehConnection.eu, and it was for use by TehConnection members only. The Network/Systems administrator of P2P-NET.eu - SpX21 - began to realize the need for a new IRC network that caters to the ever-expanding list of torrent sites that are sprawled out across different networks.

There’s some big names behind p2p-net.eu, including veteran BT staff:

Create Your Own Torrent MetaSearch Website in Minutes

August 16, 2008 by sharky

Now anyone can easily set up and run their own BitTorrent search engine website - thanks to the owner of ReleasePirate.com who has been tirelessly working on a Torrent Search Engine script, and has now made it freely available to the public for the first time.

The script is a mere 150 KB in size, and consumes very little server/system resources, since it relies entirely on the search engines of the BitTorrent sites (it’s not a database script). It’s also very customizable - you’ll be able to throw in Google AdSense or any other monetizing solution to the site theme, and add your own images, affiliates, links or anything else. Other features include:

2 New ‘Tracker Invites’ Forums Recruiting Good Members

August 14, 2008 by sharky

If private trackers are your life, then you’ll be pleased to know there’s two brand-new Invites Forums that have recently been launched. We can’t give you the URLs, since they’re both by way of "Invite Only" (for now) and they wish to remain a secret.

However, for the first one (called "Sin") serious applicants can apply through the admin (YOUWHAT) of PS3Nation.net. You’ll need to be a member there first, and fill out a short questionnaire about private trackers (it’s simple if you know anything about BitTorrent). Look for the application thread here:

Scan Your Files Online at NoVirusThanks & VirusTotal

August 13, 2008 by sharky

If you do a lot of downloading from BitTorrent & P2P then you probably already have a good anti-virus program installed, we should hope. But with all the choices for anti-virus these days, is there truly a ‘best’ solution? It’s impossible to side with just one, especially with all those "false positives" that one program will report, while the other claims the file is clean. This is commonly the case for users of McAfee and Nod32 - so which one should you trust? You could feasibly install a third, or even fourth antivirus program, but this just isn’t practical.

So why not get yourself a second opinion - or how about 36 of them. That’s where an online virus/malware multi-scan comes in handy. Great for scanning those cracks & keygens you downloaded before you unzip/unrar them. Note: There’s a 20 MB size limit per file for both of these services.

Be A Scener.com - New 0Day/Scene Tracker

August 12, 2008 by sharky

Ordinarily we wouldn’t do a full-page spread on just any new tracker that comes along - if we did, we’d have 938 pages on just this alone. But occasionally we come across a newcomer that has some darn good potential, as is the case with Be A Scener. BSC is a brand-new 0day/Scene tracker with some very impressive pre-times that compete with (and even beat) some of the best 0day trackers.

Is RLSLOG.net Nearing Its End?

August 11, 2008 by sharky

RLSLOG.net, the popular blog for new scene releases, is facing even further troubles today as a group of seven staffers tendered their resignation publicly on a blog posting. As expected, it was quickly removed as though it didn’t exist. This puts yet another nail in the coffin for RLSLOG, as nearly all of the best editors / contributors have now left the site in search of greener pastures. Here’s where it was for just a matter of hours:

http://www.rlslog.net/time-to-say-goodbye-rlslogstaff/

Here it is in full (by ReeGed):

Private Tracker Ratio Hacking - Busted Myth? Or Reality?

August 11, 2008 by sharky

[DISCLAIMER] — The purpose of this article is not aimed to teach people how to hack their ratios on private trackers. A simple Google search will provide much more information than what is written here. We do not condone nor recommend doing this. Not only will you quite possibly jeopardize your account, but more importantly it’s discernibly negative for filesharing in general. It is selfish and slows down speeds for other users, not to mention a gamut of other baneful side effects. It is with our utmost sincerity when we say we hope that everyone who cheats gets caught and banned.

With this article we bring forth awareness, and probably from what you’ll read - deterrence. Is that because ratio hacking on private trackers doesn’t work? No, it’s not that. It works TOO well - the results from our testing were obscenely lop-sided and so blatantly obvious that they’d be impossible for tracker staff to ignore - if they were looking, that is.

How To Run Multiple Instances of uTorrent (v1.7.7 & v1.8)

August 08, 2008 by sharky

In this tutorial, we’ll show you how to run multiple instances of µTorrent on the same computer. We’ve seen similar tutorials posted throughout ‘torrent forums’ in the past; however, it’s getting more difficult to find. The reason we are redoing it is to add some needed screenshots, and to use it as a setup for an upcoming article on "uTorrent Mods & Ratio Hacking" in which we need to explain how to run different versions of µTorrent on the same computer simultaneously (hacked clients vs. original). Thus, it’s not imperative that you run the same version of µTorrent for this to work - you’ll be able to run the ‘latest stable release’ v1.7.7 and the new µTorrent v1.8 at the same time.

The Problem: If you already have µTorrent installed - for example v1.7.7 - and you download the new version 1.8 and try to run it, it will either launch the previously installed (older) version; or (if you have µTorrent closed and run the new desktop ’shortcut’), it will override the older one and take over the existing torrents. While v1.8 is superior to its predecessor, it’s still not an acceptable client for most private trackers, so it should be used with discretion. For torrenters who want to run both versions concurrently (or play around with hacked / modded µTorrent clients), here is the solution:

The Best of YouTube: Torrent Guides, How-To’s & Tutorials

August 07, 2008 by sharky

For torrenters who prefer to "see" a tutorial in real-time rather than try to follow some wordy & confusing guide, YouTube offers a goldmine of videos pertaining to BitTorrent tutorials and how-to’s. Everything from ‘Download Torrents on Your PS3′ to ‘Increase µTorrent Speeds’ can be found. The caveat being; as with everything else on YouTube, much of the content leaves a lot to be desired, and guides are no exception - some are horribly amateurish; while others are brilliantly done.

We’ve come up with a collection of YouTube’s "Best of BitTorrent" videos. With almost 500,000 views, here is the #1 Top Viewed BitTorrent Tutorial video on Youtube:

Fux0r Becomes the Fifth Tracker To Use Gazelle Code

August 05, 2008 by sharky

A new adult tracker aptly named ‘Fux0r’ is only the fifth BitTorrent tracker to utilize the shiny new Gazelle codebase. Aside from What.cd, the other three include nTorrents, Vortex Network and SaveTheCoratee. Look to sign up to Fux0r at http://gazelle.fux0r.eu.

Gazelle, the revolutionary tracker codebase from the creative minds behind What.cd, is still at least two weeks away from an official first release candidate, yet it’s already available to aspiring BitTorrent communities through What.cd:

OVH Hosting Outlaws All P2P/Torrents On Their Servers

August 04, 2008 by sharky

Once revered to be an affordable safe-haven for torrenting, OVH is beginning to crack down on anyone caught using P2P/BitTorrent on their servers. This also includes the thousands of renters who are using the cheap Kimsufi package as a makeshift seedbox - indeed, this is sad news for seedbox owners and resellers alike. OVH - longtime regarded as a seedbox provider that "turns a blind eye" to illegal activities, is now complying with copyright-infringement letters that are being forwarded to them in regards to torrents being found on their servers.

The most memorable OVH shutdown has been Vortex Network, which was hosted there. Fortunately for them they were given a 48-hour grace period, instead of having the rug pulled out from under them unbeknownst and without warning, as was the case for all those trackers hosted in Malaysia. However, we can’t help but feel somewhat personally responsible for OVH’s decision, since the original OVH complaint had our FileShareFreak article included as proof that it is, "indeed a warez site":

Seeding Tips & Tricks for Specific Private Trackers

August 03, 2008 by sharky

We probably don’t have to tell you that maintaining a good sharing ratio on your private trackers is crucial to keeping the account. Period. However, no tracker is alike - we’d like to break this down a little further and delve into the seeding secrets behind individual trackers.

As an example, new users to What.cd and Waffles will wonder how it can ever be possible to make it to ‘Power User’, when the torrents just don’t seem to seed. TorrentLeech and RevTT users may find it extremely easy to buffer their accounts in no time at all at these 0day trackers. So instead of seeing "This account has been disabled", we’d rather you be privy to a great buffer.

Vortex Leader Resigns, Spawns Spinoff Site from Ex-Staff

August 02, 2008 by sharky

Rachel Faith Anderson, the sysop/admin of Vortex Network, has resigned today after strong allegations in connection with a Pay2Leech scandal and a global "BitTorrent Domination" mindset. Vortex staffers have been jumping ship even before her tended resignation / impeachment, and even What.cd - who supplied the Gazelle codebase and worked closely throughout the developmental stages - has now officially disassociated themselves from any connection to Vortex.

Meanwhile, a brand-new Mac tracker comprised of ex-Vortex staff is using the Gazelle codebase (with What.cd endorsement), making it only the fourth tracker to use What.cd’s much-applauded Gazelle. Introducing SaveTheCoratee.org.

Hackers Steal ‘User Database’ From Popular Private Tracker

August 01, 2008 by sharky

Last weekend, www.TTi.nu - the popular Swedish/English private tracker, became the latest BitTorrent site to fall prey to hackers. But what makes this particular situation a little different is that the hackers didn’t shut down the site (or even the tracker), or attempt to cause any other disturbances. Eerily, and uncharacteristically of most hackers, they wanted to slip in and out completely unnoticed - not wreak havoc as expected. They had a specific target; a clear agenda. The hackers wanted the entire site database of all users’ information - and they were successful.