Many people here haven't noticed the red flags despite countless discussions about the topic, which is why this needs to be brought up.

Hacking and cons are all about social engineering. Nobody sane will spend money running a shady website that steals an already free work. Most of pirate sites are just disposable baits, looking for outdated browsers to exploit (just because it doesn't tries to shove in a malware right away, it doesn't mean it isn't probing around for an opportunity), harvest personal data from DMCAs to use and/or sell, and maybe snatch some payment informations too. They're also usually ran on infected computers, so even an six digit attorney can kiss them in four letters, and all attempts to fight them directly is pointless.

What you can do about it? Request takedown of their links on Google and chill out. In reality those sites do next to none harm unless you're publishing your work, because they hardly ever appear in searches and don't have any audience besides numbers full of air.

This isn't wild west of translated works where language barrier separates readers from original source, allowing people to cash on this barrier and chaos. You can rest assured that any sucker who triest to do that with free and widely available works will fail miserably, unless they're posting on another legit sites to scrap the barrel before they're slapped into oblivion (*cough* Webnovel *cough*).

So stay god damn safe, keep your heads clear, and develop a sharp sense for bullsh*t. With hackers being able to use computers of other people as disposable servers/proxies/bots, everyone can be a target.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: harvest personal data from DMCAs to use and/or sell

Lol what. No. They're not spending money to host a website and pirating novels just to try to attain and profit off the limited information a DMCA provides. That's not how any of this works. Trying to use that, again, very limited information of a few thousand artists is going to pay off about as much to buy a few cups of coffee. 

Of the many ways to use social engineering to harvest personal information? That would be one of the most needlessly costly, overly complicated plans focusing on a handful of people with little to no payoff.

They're not targeting the artists. The product of the artist is being used as bait. They're targeting the much more numerous audience. Whether to profit off of via ad revenue or more malicious means.

Yea, this is a reach and a half.

People likely share more on their facebook feed than they do in an email. Plus what has already been mentioned above.

The much simpler explanation is just ad money.


Also if you’re really worried about hackers, you should probably update your router’s firmware.

There's not enough personal info on a DMCA to even open a checking account, much less 'snatch payment informations'.

Ziggy Wrote:

InfantryTerminator Wrote: harvest personal data from DMCAs to use and/or sell

Lol what. No. They're not spending money to host a website and pirating novels just to try to attain and profit off the limited information a DMCA provides. That's not how any of this works. Trying to use that, again, very limited information of a few thousand artists is going to pay off about as much to buy a few cups of coffee. 

Of the many ways to use social engineering to harvest personal information? That would be one of the most needlessly costly, overly complicated plans focusing on a handful of people with little to no payoff.

They're not targeting the artists. The product of the artist is being used as bait. They're targeting the much more numerous audience. Whether to profit off of via ad revenue or more malicious means.

I develop malware as a hobby, so I know thing and two about methods of black hats.

Most of those sites are hosted on compromised computers. This stuff runs for completely free and doesn't require any maintenance besides checking an email once per month (mirror sites and fronts update on their own). Old boomers who haven't updated in years are the main reason why Cloudflare exists.

From this point there are two types of sites: The free passive ad income, and actual malicous one.

Free passive is not even maintained in any form besides claiming revenue. DMCA can kiss them in four letters because that stuff can be ignored if they're oversea.

As for the second type, DMCA takedown that those sites "accept" require at least your full legal name, and in some cases like Webnovel even a home adress. This might not be much for you, but knowing who's behind the nickname is already an extreme advantage for hackers as it opens the doors for more social tricks. If I had your legal name, it would be easy as breathing to construct an email that will make you click on a spiked PDF.

...Actually, I could've send you the PDF in response to your DMCA and you would've clicked anyway...

I wouldn't be even after your story. It's just an attack on your computer to search for something of value and turn you into another free fishing net for other projects. And who knows, maybe I'll catch a high roller and crack a jackpot?

You're all lucky that I'm not skilled enough to produce anything serious, because you wouldn't pry off a dancing Rick Ashley off your wallpapers anytime soon.

Paradoxcloud Wrote: Also if you’re really worried about hackers, you should probably update your router’s firmware.

Most routers do auto updates during the night.

VVerity Wrote: There's not enough personal info on a DMCA to even open a checking account, much less 'snatch payment informations'.

I was talking about readers going in and paying for stolen works. Sorry for not making in clear, but this thread is disposable one to get a feedback before making a final product.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: I develop malware as a hobby, so I know thing and two about methods of black hats.

If you think this convoluted method to purposefully invite in DMCA's just to get the person's legal name would be an effective means of utilizing social engineering and malware? You're really bad at your hobby lol.

You can go on the darknet today, right now, and buy the private information of hundreds of thousands of people. For pennies on the dollar. And this would give you far more actionable information than just their legal names. You'd also get known usernames, passwords, addresses, all sorts of information. You'd get more information from more people for cheaper and easier than developing and paying for an entire site being up.

If you're going to bother to set a site up to try to do this, doing it just to get DMCA's gives you almost nothing compared to harvesting the data of the audience that logs in. Let's say I'm the person doing this. Why on earth would I waste my time with the people that only give me their real name, versus the people that give me usernames, emails and passwords? I can leverage the latter far easier and more effectively than the former. You also get way more victims through your audience than the handful of artists that send you DMCA notices.

Suggesting people not bother sending DMCA's just in case the pirater wants their legal name is silly on the face of it. Even if we completely ignore the above reasons, any author moving to KU frequently has to send a DMCA to satisfy Amazon's desires for exclusivity. So they don't have a choice. And telling people to not send DMCA's is like telling someone not to report a crime like assault because it might be some extremely convoluted method to find out the person's name. Guess we should all just never use the legal system then.

Ziggy Wrote:

InfantryTerminator Wrote: I develop malware as a hobby, so I know thing and two about methods of black hats.

If you think this convoluted method to purposefully invite in DMCA's just to get the person's legal name would be an effective means of utilizing social engineering and malware? You're really bad at your hobby lol.

You can go on the darknet today, right now, and buy the private information of hundreds of thousands of people. For pennies on the dollar. And this would give you far more actionable information than just their legal names. You'd also get known usernames, passwords, addresses, all sorts of information. You'd get more information from more people for cheaper and easier than developing and paying for an entire site being up.

If you're going to bother to set a site up to try to do this, doing it just to get DMCA's gives you almost nothing compared to harvesting the data of the audience that logs in. Let's say I'm the person doing this. Why on earth would I waste my time with the people that only give me their real name, versus the people that give me usernames, emails and passwords? I can leverage the latter far easier and more effectively than the former. You also get way more victims through your audience than the handful of artists that send you DMCA notices.

Suggesting people not bother sending DMCA's just in case the pirater wants their legal name is silly on the face of it. Even if we completely ignore the above reasons, any author moving to KU frequently has to send a DMCA to satisfy Amazon's desires for exclusivity. So they don't have a choice. And telling people to not send DMCA's is like telling someone not to report a crime like assault because it might be some extremely convoluted method to find out the person's name. Guess we should all just never use the legal system then.

Lol darkweb.

Just use facebook.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: Most routers do auto updates during the night.

Yea, but are you sure that yours does without guessing?

You’d be surprised, or maybe not, at the amount of people running old routers that haven’t been updated in years.

Ziggy Wrote:

InfantryTerminator Wrote: I develop malware as a hobby, so I know thing and two about methods of black hats.

If you think this convoluted method to purposefully invite in DMCA's just to get the person's legal name would be an effective means of utilizing social engineering and malware? You're really bad at your hobby lol.

You can go on the darknet today, right now, and buy the private information of hundreds of thousands of people. For pennies on the dollar. And this would give you far more actionable information than just their legal names. You'd also get known usernames, passwords, addresses, all sorts of information. You'd get more information from more people for cheaper and easier than developing and paying for an entire site being up.

If you're going to bother to set a site up to try to do this, doing it just to get DMCA's gives you almost nothing compared to harvesting the data of the audience that logs in. Let's say I'm the person doing this. Why on earth would I waste my time with the people that only give me their real name, versus the people that give me usernames, emails and passwords? I can leverage the latter far easier and more effectively than the former. You also get way more victims through your audience than the handful of artists that send you DMCA notices.

Suggesting people not bother sending DMCA's just in case the pirater wants their legal name is silly on the face of it. Even if we completely ignore the above reasons, any author moving to KU frequently has to send a DMCA to satisfy Amazon's desires for exclusivity. So they don't have a choice. And telling people to not send DMCA's is like telling someone not to report a crime like assault because it might be some extremely convoluted method to find out the person's name. Guess we should all just never use the legal system then.

If you don't know how things work, then don't speak. Most of personal info is crammed into databases. Each personal info is like couple of bucks, but the entire database you need to buy costs quite a lot, unless it's a junk one. Plus most of actually useful ones come from data breaches like Wattpad one, and not everyone get caught in those.

And yes, your legal name is very useful. There are so many ways to approach a target, and you can get people to click on that spiked PDF out of sheer surprise just by calling someone in a email by real name. This isn't even some secret knowledge that people do stupid things out of panic. To be honest, it's piss easy to get anyone to click on that PDF, but getting past site, browser, and system security (without being tracked back too) is pain and a half.

It's obvious that a harvesting site would leech onto everything possible. However, how much people a site like that can get to register? Ten? It's way easier to bait authors who will quickly come rushing at single mention of you pirating their work, and DMCA also includes contact info like email.

Contacting a site itself is the worst method you can use a DMCA, unless the site is actually a competent and non-malicious one. It's like bringing a robbery report to a person who robbed you instead of police station hoping that they'll get scared into giving your stuff back. What you should do is try to find out the hosting company/ISP and forward it to them, who will quickly solve the problem with termination of service notice.

aWildAsianNamedDucky Wrote: Lol darkweb.

Just use facebook.

Getting information and putting it to use are two different things. Facebook is great for getting to know your target (according to the manual), but sometimes there is barely anything useful there (according to my experience of trying to know my coworkers better) and getting someone to click on the link (which is scanned from what I looked up) can be troublesome. Discord is probably better because you can easily strike up a conversation and can create a disposable account without even an email.

Paradoxcloud Wrote:

InfantryTerminator Wrote: Most routers do auto updates during the night.

Yea, but are you sure that yours does without guessing?

You’d be surprised, or maybe not, at the amount of people running old routers that haven’t been updated in years.

Yes, I've configured it myself and double checked if the auto updates work properly. Someone managed to get into my old router couple of years ago, which is what got me into cybersecurity.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: If you don't know how things work, then don't speak.

Yeah. I do know. That's why I spoke lmao.

I am very familiar with social engineering and all of this. When I mentioned buying some info off the darknet, that wasn't obscure or ridiculous info. All the illicit markets sell that stuff, and it's dirt cheap. Why? Because everyone's information is out there and leaked over and over again. Finding that information is easy and cheap. When I said it was pennies on the dollar, I was mentioning literal listings for this information sold in tens of thousands by the lot by reputable sellers. And it wasn't dollars per person. Not even close.

Let's pie in the sky it here. Even if it were worth the absurd value of dollars per person? The time investment just to get the limited information off the handful of authors that respond with a DMCA is still not worth it. Any scammer bothering is wasting their time when there's countless, well known, lower hanging fruit methods.

Literally everyone is responding and telling you why this is absurd for a reason. This idea comes off like someone that read a book on social engineering and is combining it with a bond villain mindset. It's absolutely not what's happening.

And, again, the authors that shift to KU frequently have to do this regardless to satisfy Amazon. So your outlandish theory is irrelevant. The only warning that's relevant is, "Hey, don't open shifty stuff in your email, even if it mentions your real name." Which should already be known, but is actually valid advice.

Ziggy Wrote:

InfantryTerminator Wrote: If you don't know how things work, then don't speak.

Yeah. I do know. That's why I spoke lmao.

I am very familiar with social engineering and all of this. When I mentioned buying some info off the darknet, that wasn't obscure or ridiculous info. All the illicit markets sell that stuff, and it's dirt cheap. Why? Because everyone's information is out there and leaked over and over again. Finding that information is easy and cheap. When I said it was pennies on the dollar, I was mentioning literal listings for this information sold in tens of thousands by the lot by reputable sellers. And it wasn't dollars per person. Not even close.

Let's pie in the sky it here. Even if it were worth the absurd value of dollars per person? The time investment just to get the limited information off the handful of authors that respond with a DMCA is still not worth it. Any scammer bothering is wasting their time when there's countless, well known, lower hanging fruit methods.

Literally everyone is responding and telling you why this is absurd for a reason. This idea comes off like someone that read a book on social engineering and is combining it with a bond villain mindset. It's absolutely not what's happening.

And, again, the authors that shift to KU frequently have to do this regardless to satisfy Amazon. So your outlandish theory is irrelevant. The only warning that's relevant is, "Hey, don't open shifty stuff in your email, even if it mentions your real name." Which should already be known, but is actually valid advice.

Despite being good at social engineering (self-proclaimed), you didn't even read my post.

You can't buy a single personal information on darknet. Everything is sold in bulk in form of databases/dumps, and nobody plays with pennies. Also, the smaller the bulk, the more you pay per piece.

On top of that darknet isn't sunshine and rainbows. Scams are everywhere (Criminals are screwing each other? What a surprise!), and trying to find a cheap database/dump will only make you lose money.

Sending DMCA to their internet/host provider is way better option because they will shut down the site.

Dude. I dunno what to tell you. Warning people not to send DMCA notices just so others won't know their name is easily dismissed and ridiculous.

Let's go back to the person pointing out the Facebook argument. Your only response is that then you can't get the person to click the link. That's not the point. The point is it would be more efficient for getting people's real names and information. If you're trying to use social engineering, going right to the source is infinitely faster and easier than wasting time in some elaborate trap that they likely won't even bother tripping. There are literally thousands of easier ways to get someone's name than this ridiculous method you're proposing.

Then let's move onto your "objection" with using Facebook. If you're targeting individuals, you can easily find specific topics to email or discuss with them to get them to click a link. People are not very security conscious, it's pretty easy. Whether it's through discord, snapchat, facebook, whatever. This convoluted method of having the target email you first, only to respond with this lackluster attempt? So much pointless work, for a method that frequently won't pay off, targeting an extremely small group of a few thousand artists.

There's a reason the vast majority of social engineering is done en masse and not on an individual basis. It's far easier and more profitable. If you're targeting individuals? This would be about one of the most pointless attempts I can think of with such little payoff even in the best case scenario.

And oh hey, the moment one of your targets spills the beans on RoyalRoad that they were sent a scummy link with their name after sending the DMCA, all of your targets are alerted beforehand and the jig is up. Weird how that hasn't happened yet except by someone proposing a conspiracy theory about it. Almost like it's not happening at all.

When I said this reads like someone read a book on it and combined it with a bond villain, I don't think I got my point across. Let me give a more apt comparison. This reads like someone that just took a psych 101 class trying to tell a friend they know that they're acting a certain way because of some deep-seated trauma and being completely off-base. Another friend that's an actual psychologist overhears and tells them what they said is pretty unlikely in the extreme. The psych 101 student doubles down. That's the vibe here.

Sending DMCA notices is fine. They should absolutely still send those and frequently have to. The only relevant and actionable advice here is: "Be careful opening stuff in your email and clicking links." That's it. Doing that nips this in the bud regardless of if they send 1 or 1000 DMCA notices. Doing that solves this problem even in the bizarro universe where someone actually is wasting their time with the most convoluted and poor attempt at social engineering I've heard in the past decade. 

Tah-dah, problem solved.

Ziggy Wrote: Dude. I dunno what to tell you. Warning people not to send DMCA notices just so others won't know their name is easily dismissed and ridiculous.

Let's go back to the person pointing out the Facebook argument. Your only response is that then you can't get the person to click the link. That's not the point. The point is it would be more efficient for getting people's real names and information. If you're trying to use social engineering, going right to the source is infinitely faster and easier than wasting time in some elaborate trap that they likely won't even bother tripping. There are literally thousands of easier ways to get someone's name than this ridiculous method you're proposing.

Then let's move onto your "objection" with using Facebook. If you're targeting individuals, you can easily find specific topics to email or discuss with them to get them to click a link. People are not very security conscious, it's pretty easy. Whether it's through discord, snapchat, facebook, whatever. This convoluted method of having the target email you first, only to respond with this lackluster attempt? So much pointless work, for a method that frequently won't pay off, targeting an extremely small group of a few thousand artists.

There's a reason the vast majority of social engineering is done en masse and not on an individual basis. It's far easier and more profitable. If you're targeting individuals? This would be about one of the most pointless attempts I can think of with such little payoff even in the best case scenario.

And oh hey, the moment one of your targets spills the beans on RoyalRoad that they were sent a scummy link with their name after sending the DMCA, all of your targets are alerted beforehand and the jig is up. Weird how that hasn't happened yet except by someone proposing a conspiracy theory about it. Almost like it's not happening at all.

When I said this reads like someone read a book on it and combined it with a bond villain, I don't think I got my point across. Let me give a more apt comparison. This reads like someone that just took a psych 101 class trying to tell a friend they know that they're acting a certain way because of some deep-seated trauma and being completely off-base. Another friend that's an actual psychologist overhears and tells them what they said is pretty unlikely in the extreme. The psych 101 student doubles down. That's the vibe here.

Sending DMCA notices is fine. They should absolutely still send those and frequently have to. The only relevant and actionable advice here is: "Be careful opening stuff in your email and clicking links." That's it. Doing that nips this in the bud regardless of if they send 1 or 1000 DMCA notices. Doing that solves this problem even in the bizarro universe where someone actually is wasting their time with the most convoluted and poor attempt at social engineering I've heard in the past decade. 

Tah-dah, problem solved.

Did you even put a thought behind anything you say? I sound like a bond villian, maybe, but that's because I don't know how to explain things to normies like you. I've spent years among people who usually know more than me, and never needed to go in-depth. I'm also not a school teacher.

So you want to know why FB is worse option that bunch of authors? Fine, I'll break it down for ya'

FB attacks - Requires you to spend extensive amount of time on each target, and don't get to know potientialy valuable informations like their email adress and behind what nicknames they hide on other sites.

Also, finding someone active and with enough informations to strike up a natural conversation can take a lot of time. 

Then you need to be skilled enough to dodge FB file and link scans. Unless you're trying to steal passwords and emails through having them register, which takes additional load of effort in convincing and making the site.

Rage baiting authors - Set up a malicious mirror site, even a half-assed one, then create a post on writing forums about it and PM authors directly.

Compared to FB method it's quicker, less time consuming per target, plus you now have connection between their real and internet identity to get know the target even better (you can also look up their FB with this method, but not vice-versa), and a way of direct contact they won't ignore easily. From this point onwards you can:

1. Find them on other sites and attack them there, erasing connection between attacks and your site, allowing it to operate longer.

2. Respond to their email with "Your DMCA doesn't meet our requirements", then add in a PDF spiked with malware with said requitements. Once they send another one, take down the story to build up trust and potentialy bait even more people. Even if someone realizes that something is off about their computer, there is a huge chance that they won't connect the dots right away unless antivirus points at your spiked PDF.

And what will that DMCA notice do to the site itself? Without a lawyer to push it to the court, those pirate sites can just laugh it off especially if it's run by shady means or located in countries like China. 

Meanwhile do what I said: Send it to their internet/hosting provider who actually have power over the site. It would counts for pleasing Amazon, and also might end up in that site going down.

Gun safety rule "Never point the gun towards others, even if it's unloaded" is also silly to many people, but prevented countless accidents. Same goes for cybersecurity.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: I sound like a bond villian, maybe, but that's because I don't know how to explain things to normies like you.

Lmao hoo. Of all the things you could've said, that was.. pretty bad. Bless your heart.

You didn't address several of the ways I demonstrated this idea is absolutely ridiculous on the face of it. Likely because they're such gaping problems with the idea you can't. Nor that my final line about telling people to be wary of opening things solves this issue without absurdly insisting that people shouldn't send DMCA notices.

But that's fine. You've demonstrated pretty thoroughly that you're determined to cling to this idea with a death grip no matter what I say.

Just do me a favor. You said this is your hobby, yeah? Surely you're at least aware of some of the scammer forums, if not a member. Go on there and make this suggestion about making a site just to purposefully bait DMCA notices from authors. No need to report back on it, I can already predict the reaction. I just want you to get enough responses so the truth sinks in. Since obviously none of the responses here, especially mine, are going to be taken to heart.

Ziggy Wrote:

InfantryTerminator Wrote: I sound like a bond villian, maybe, but that's because I don't know how to explain things to normies like you.

Lmao hoo. Of all the things you could've said, that was.. pretty bad. Bless your heart.

You didn't address several of the ways I demonstrated this idea is absolutely ridiculous on the face of it. Likely because they're such gaping problems with the idea you can't. Nor that my final line about telling people to be wary of opening things solves this issue without absurdly insisting that people shouldn't send DMCA notices.

But that's fine. You've demonstrated pretty thoroughly that you're determined to cling to this idea with a death grip no matter what I say.

Just do me a favor. You said this is your hobby, yeah? Surely you're at least aware of some of the scammer forums, if not a member. Go on there and make this suggestion about making a site just to purposefully bait DMCA notices from authors. No need to report back on it, I can already predict the reaction. I just want you to get enough responses so the truth sinks in. Since obviously none of the responses here, especially mine, are going to be taken to heart.

Alright, I've reached my internet specialist tolerance limit. Time to call out your BS and make look you like a clown.

"You should send your notice to the service provider who is responsible for the site"

Litteraly what I've been saying, a thing you've ignored for like two replies now, and first line to appear in google search "where I should send a DMCA" wrote by a professional site about copyright. You didn't even bothered to look up BASICS and still have gals to spread misinformation. 

I didn't adress what you were saying because it's utter nonsense. There are also no such thing as "scammer forums", unless you count bunch of people fooling around (script kittens and aspirers), and you don't even know how "hackers" are divided.

There are hats. Black ones are the malicious ones, greys are the vigilates often balancing on edge of the law, and white ones are the good guys.

I roll with whites, poking around and trying to find vulnerabilities in open source software, then report them to their owner. Malware development is just a hobby I picked along the way and is used for legit pentesting.

Pentesting without consent, which greys do, is already on thin ice of law, no matter how much goodwill you put behind it. And what you're asking me for requires redistribution of copyrighted materials and pwning multiple people just to teach them a basic lesson, which crosses the line by miles. Other white hats won't ever touch this idea and asking them to will only skew my hard earned reputation. Grey hats? I won't even bother to find someone, because I'll get dragged into legal trouble as I'm the one who came up with the idea.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: Litteraly what I've been saying, a thing you've ignored for like two replies now, and first line to appear in google search "where I should send a DMCA" wrote by a professional site about copyright. You didn't even bothered to look up BASICS and still have gals to spread misinformation.

Er no. I didn't address it because it's irrelevant to what I'm objecting to. Your premise is, "Don't send DMCA notice! The website is just a trap to trick you in a convoluted plot and harvesting the (extremely limited) information in the DMCA!" Pointing out where to send the DMCA doesn't change my argument. It's still the most ridiculous and unlikely social engineering conspiracy I've heard in years. My recommended course of action with basic internet security advice still solves the issue even in the bizarro universe someone went to such lengths for such little gain.

If you nix the conspiracy theory and this was just a post telling authors how to properly send a DMCA notice, then yeah. Great info, zero objections. Alas, you didn't, hence everyone that responded pointing out how silly your post is lol.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: I didn't adress what you were saying because it's utter nonsense. There are also no such thing as "scammer forums", unless you count bunch of people fooling around (script kittens and aspirers), and you don't even know how "hackers" are divided.

Do.. do you not use onion sites? Have you really not come across any of the several, notorious scammer and hacker forums? They're pretty easy to find. This is ignoring the more legit sites and forums completely. Even the most inept script kiddie on either side would be baffled at why anyone would bother putting so much effort into such an elaborate ruse that stops working the moment one person catches it happening and tells your incredibly small and centralized target population.

Not mentioning hats doesn't mean I'm not aware of the terms. What I said didn't require I use them. Like, they mention those terms even in horribly inaccurate crime shows. Even my technologically illiterate mom knows them. Are you really so disconnected and elitist that you think people don't know even that much? Wait, who am I kidding. You already used "normie" without irony. Of course you are.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: And what you're asking me for requires redistribution of copyrighted materials and pwning multiple people just to teach them a basic lesson, which crosses the line by miles.

...Lol what. That is not what I suggested at all. I am baffled how you managed to translate what I said into this.

I pointed out that you're obviously not going to take anything I say seriously and the discussion is clearly bad faith nonsense that isn't going anywhere. So I suggested you go somewhere else to get a wake up call from people you might actually listen to.

Asking about the feasibility of the concept on a forum where you'd actually listen doesn't taint your reputation or make you responsible. I'm talking making a post along the lines of: "hey, was I right to warn people that this site is just trying to trick writers into sending DMCA notices to harvest and/or utilize the information therein? Or is this dumb?" That's about as innocent as it gets, especially considering you're asking about a specific site that's already up and running. If you would get in trouble for that, this very post makes you just as culpable and you're already screwed.

If you're still strangely terrified to pose such a harmless question, I'd think somebody even halfway technology literate could find a way to do so safely and anonymously. Silly me.

But why would you bother? Calling me a nOrMiE and a clown surely demonstrated the validity of your argument. Your totally levelheaded and adult responses showed us what a l337 haxx0r you are. Feel free to continue to mock me and further show us the depth of your character. Obviously I was a fool to ever doubt you and I retract all objections. You win.

famous words from a famous businessman named Gabe Newell piracy is a service problem if your service sucks people are more likely the pirate your stuff so make sure you pick a store it doesn't suck ass in the way of service if you trying to sell your products or books

an area where you guys could be getting screwed at if your stories popular audiobooks if you don't offer one somebody else will try to make one and you'll lose money there you should think about it

Ziggy Wrote:

InfantryTerminator Wrote: Litteraly what I've been saying, a thing you've ignored for like two replies now, and first line to appear in google search "where I should send a DMCA" wrote by a professional site about copyright. You didn't even bothered to look up BASICS and still have gals to spread misinformation.

Er no. I didn't address it because it's irrelevant to what I'm objecting to. Your premise is, "Don't send DMCA notice! The website is just a trap to trick you in a convoluted plot and harvesting the (extremely limited) information in the DMCA!" Pointing out where to send the DMCA doesn't change my argument. It's still the most ridiculous and unlikely social engineering conspiracy I've heard in years. My recommended course of action with basic internet security advice still solves the issue even in the bizarro universe someone went to such lengths for such little gain.

If you nix the conspiracy theory and this was just a post telling authors how to properly send a DMCA notice, then yeah. Great info, zero objections. Alas, you didn't, hence everyone that responded pointing out how silly your post is lol.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: I didn't adress what you were saying because it's utter nonsense. There are also no such thing as "scammer forums", unless you count bunch of people fooling around (script kittens and aspirers), and you don't even know how "hackers" are divided.

Do.. do you not use onion sites? Have you really not come across any of the several, notorious scammer and hacker forums? They're pretty easy to find. This is ignoring the more legit sites and forums completely. Even the most inept script kiddie on either side would be baffled at why anyone would bother putting so much effort into such an elaborate ruse that stops working the moment one person catches it happening and tells your incredibly small and centralized target population.

Not mentioning hats doesn't mean I'm not aware of the terms. What I said didn't require I use them. Like, they mention those terms even in horribly inaccurate crime shows. Even my technologically illiterate mom knows them. Are you really so disconnected and elitist that you think people don't know even that much? Wait, who am I kidding. You already used "normie" without irony. Of course you are.

InfantryTerminator Wrote: And what you're asking me for requires redistribution of copyrighted materials and pwning multiple people just to teach them a basic lesson, which crosses the line by miles.

...Lol what. That is not what I suggested at all. I am baffled how you managed to translate what I said into this.

I pointed out that you're obviously not going to take anything I say seriously and the discussion is clearly bad faith nonsense that isn't going anywhere. So I suggested you go somewhere else to get a wake up call from people you might actually listen to.

Asking about the feasibility of the concept on a forum where you'd actually listen doesn't taint your reputation or make you responsible. I'm talking making a post along the lines of: "hey, was I right to warn people that this site is just trying to trick writers into sending DMCA notices to harvest and/or utilize the information therein? Or is this dumb?" That's about as innocent as it gets, especially considering you're asking about a specific site that's already up and running. If you would get in trouble for that, this very post makes you just as culpable and you're already screwed.

If you're still strangely terrified to pose such a harmless question, I'd think somebody even halfway technology literate could find a way to do so safely and anonymously. Silly me.

But why would you bother? Calling me a nOrMiE and a clown surely demonstrated the validity of your argument. Your totally levelheaded and adult responses showed us what a l337 haxx0r you are. Feel free to continue to mock me and further show us the depth of your character. Obviously I was a fool to ever doubt you and I retract all objections. You win.

Sorry for calling you a normie and a clown, but I'm pretty pissed off this week and you just happen to reply at end of a day when I'm slamming things done. The initial thread topic was half-assed, which I admitted somewhere above. I'm actually only gathering feedback to make better thread because, let's face it, I'm not used to explain things which usually results in those long ass back-and-fourth chains. The weird translation is me misremembering things. I was writing the reply and needed to step out for couple of hours before returning with "slamming things done" mode on and writing everything in one go before going to sleep. Sorry for that. I just caught a small break from problems and had some time to cool off, so I'm straightening things up.

The main reason why I'm against DMCAs directly to site is both for reasons of security and getting things done. For a pirated site, DMCA is a suggestion at best,especially when they're outside of US where DMCA holds no power and only shows that you might not be knowledgeable enough to get them into trouble. It's better to send it to their internet/hosting provider which checkmarks Amazon requirements you've mentioned and can get the job don without help of lawyer. Pirate sites are run by a type of people that are likely to be scammers. No matter how little personal informations a DMCA contains, it's still a bad idea to spoon feed it to them.

Why would I bother onion sites? They're god damn awful, filled with scammers, edgy script kids, and feds. All "notorious" hacker forums are breached by feds one by one.
Legit ones? Besides the ones that discuss news and vulnerabilities others are barely active, while everyone else has a closed off groups where you need some achievements to get it. I already have a rather iffy reputation for light trolling tendencies and developing harmful malware for seemingly no reason besides my own amusement (totally not perceived as tell tale of a someone with malicious intent) in a bug hunting group I'm part of, and I don't want any more red flags around me.

I did asked couple of friends for feedback on my topic, but they've responded with some form of "Probably". My point is bit exaggerated because most of those sites don't even bother looking at DMCA in first place, but it doesn't mean that someone won't pluck that low hanging fruit even if it's a small one. And if there is one thing that information security taught me well, it's: "Better safe than sorry".

Another thing worth to mention is that the current golden horse of hackers and scammers, cryptocurrency, is currently cracking. After it's beaten to death, those people will move to other places to leach on, even if it's a short term gain that allows them to survive until another "get rich quickly" things props up.

And yes, this type of scam would be easier to pull off than FB one. You're probably thinking about niggerian prince and friends, and I'm about hackers.

FB one is also niche because there are only so much old people and fools on FB you can find, especially those who weren't already scammed and became harder target. Meanwhile setting up a pirate site that mirrors content of RR takes like couple of days, but baiting a people into it requires only a single forum post and one PM per author. In both cases someone reporting you will nuke the operation: FB will delete your account on the spot, while RR mods will start the purge. The only difference is that baiting authors can quickly net you dozens of victims (remember malware spiked method I've mentioned, it doesn't need that much time), and you can do other things in meantime of waiting for emails to respond to. What after it gets busted? You burn (format or whatever) the disposable proxy that hosted the site and move onto other targets, making sure there aren't any leads to you.

Keep in mind that I'm writing down a rough outline for the plan, which is why it sounds so shitty to you. Actually pulling that off requires some creativity that isn't just another nigerian prince scam, and there are some steps in between that make it tick, but aren't important to our discussion itself.

Even clicking the link to go look at site that steals works can be risky. Adds can carry malware that can run without you even clicking on them. Make sure when looking for people copyright infringing you have up to date security software on your computer, add block, pop up blocker, anti-tracking, disable javascript/cookies... Actually, best to spin up a virtual machine to click the link that a friend sent to show you that your story was stolen. 

I think the biggest point of those sites is just to try and skim/get malware on computers. That or since a particular one we know all Royal Road stories are copied to is based out of Hong Kong if I remember correctly; their audience/targets might be Chinese readers who want English stories post on sites blocked by the great firewall. You don't realize how much is blocked until you go over there and can't get on any website you are used to using (I used what I call my "burner" travel phone when over there). 

Am I paranoid? Probably, and rightfully so. In cryptography many years ago I learned every algorithm except one is crackable (and at some point RSA 2048 will probably also be cracked), and most people don't encrypt with the only safe algorithm because it's hard to implement and the others are "safe enough". 

Everything we do is tracked. Our information has already been sold. The only thing we can do is fortify our fortress and beg the tech giants for help that they will not give. Welcome to reality where our digital existence means more than our physical existence because your identity and existence can be stolen. 

Everything is just security theater. It's much like the physical locks on house that won't stop anyone with a lockpick. 

If you aren't paranoid about everything, including the thief at your digital door, then you aren't operating in reality. (including if a friend sends a link, start asking the friend personal questions only they know. Their account might be compromised). 

I've heard that the site who shall not be named has ignored DCMAs. Cloudflare, whom they use for masking, won't do anything about them either from what I heard. Only recourse is trying to stop the google searches from hitting them (which is why you should use a search like Duck Duck Go because they never even showed me that site to start with. Google wants money and doesn't actually care what shady place they are sending you to. Also google wants your data and sells your data to everyone anyway.)

Is this the most non-sequitur response yet? Yes. 

Probably because I have spun my head around this problem a bunch, and after lots of thought there is nothing I can really do about the site that copies from Royal Road except not post my stories online anymore. Well, guess that ship already sailed for my current stories. For other authors. that might be the future for anything they want to publish using a platform that has an exclusivity right to it. (Amazon KU). For myself, I will probably just continue doing non KU publishing and publish to every place I possibly can using Draft 2 Digital.