Tag: stream ripper

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YouTube quietly begins blocking MP3 stream-ripping sites

The latest plague to hit the music industry has found itself in a losing battle with the world’s largest video platform.

Stream-ripping is the most popular way to pirate music in 2019. Fear of malware drove people away from torrents long ago, and file-sharing services such as Mediafire lost their luster after they began removing copyrighted material almost as fast as people could upload it, but for the last several years, stream-ripping has been largely untouched by the pressure of the music industry. Only a handful of sites have been taken offline, and far more have risen to replace them.

In virtually every report on piracy released since 2015, industry leaders and organizations alike have noted the need for tech giants to involve themselves in the war against digital theft. YouTube and Google, which are now owned by the same company, have largely remained silent on the matter. That lead the music business to feel as if these platforms didn’t care or that they believed fighting piracy was the industry’s responsibility alone, but this week, something changed.

According to a report from TorrentFreak, which has been confirmed by Haulix Daily, YouTube has recently began blocking stream-ripping sites from pirating music and other copyrighted materials. The number of sites included in the effort is unclear, but research by Haulix staff earlier today (July 11) found the top 10 Google results for ‘YouTube to MP3,’ ‘Youtube MP3,’ and ‘Free YouTube Conversion’ all impacted by the change.

“All my servers are blocked with error ‘HTTP Error 429: Too Many Requests’,” the operator of Dlnowsoft.com informs TorrentFreak. As a result, the stream-ripping site currently displays a “service temporarily unavailable, we will come back soon” error message. 

Onlinevideoconverter.com, one of the top 200 most-visited sites on the internet, appears to be affected as well. While videos from sites such as Vimeo can still be converted, YouTube links now return the following error message. 

None of the websites impacted by the recent blocks were warned in advance of the changes.

Haulix Daily contacted YouTube for more information, but the company has not responded. YouTube has also made no public comments about the blocks, but the widespread impact makes it clear the company is sending a message regarding their views on piracy. We will bring you more information as it becomes available.

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Industry News News

With Convert2MP3 shut down, what’s next for the war on stream-ripping?

After years of legal battles, the global music industry found success in the war against piracy after forcing stream-ripping site Convert2MP3 to shutter operations.

The war against music piracy rages on in 2019. Despite significant growth for the streaming marketplace, millions of people continue to pirate music as a means of accessing materials for free. Torrents and file-sharing sites such as Mediafire have lost their appeal to pirates in recent years, but they have been replaced by stream-ripping services that allow consumers to steal audio from video clips and convert them into MP3 files. These sites, which often cost nothing to use, are a scourge on the entertainment business.

In 2016, the RIAA, IFPI, and BPI filed legal action against YouTube-MP3, the largest stream ripping site at the time. This case eventually resulted in a settlement in which the site agreed to shut down voluntarily.

Since that time, the music industry and the many groups around the world working to ensure its continued growth, have set their sights on a number of additional websites promoting free stream-ripping services. That included Convert2MP3, which was sued in Germany with backing from the music groups IFPI and BVMI.

Convert2MP3 has been considered one of the most popular stream-ripping destinations online. The site has previously seen tens of millions of people use its service monthly, and that popularity made it a prime target in the music industry’s war against piracy.

The court proceeding surrounding Convert2MP3 has rarely been in the headlines, but that changed earlier this week when Music group IFPI announced that in a combined effort with the German industry group BVMI, it has reached a settlement with the stream-ripping site. The settlement requires the site to shut down immediately and hand over its domain name to IFPI. 

The settlement also requires the unnamed person or persons behind Convert2MP3 to pay financial compensation. The amount owed has not been made public.

IFPI’s Chief Executive Frances Moore is pleased with the outcome and hopes that it will motivate other stream-rippers to follow suit.

“Stream ripping is a threat to the entire music ecosystem. Sites such as Convert2MP3 show complete disregard for the rights of artists and record companies and take money away from those creating and investing in music.

“The successful outcome of this case sends a clear signal to other stream ripping sites that they should stop their copyright infringing activities or face legal action,” Moore adds.

Not everyone agrees that these type of sites are by definition copyright-infringing. In a letter to the US Trade Representative, digital rights group EFF previously stressed that there are plenty of legal use cases as well.

“[M]any audio extractions qualify as non-infringing fair uses under copyright. Providing a service that is capable of extracting audio tracks for these lawful purposes is itself lawful, even if some users infringe,” EFF wrote.

EFF has a point. There are instances where stream-ripping does not infringe on a copyright, but those cases are few and far between. The vast majority of stream-ripping use does infringe on others’ intellectual property. Is the risk of losing millions to illegal piracy worth making services like that previously offered by Convert2MP3 free to the public?

Perhaps a better solution would be a third-party service that reviews stream-ripping requests. If not that, maybe consumers wishing to rip audio from videos should pay a fee to do so, thus ensuring any parties owed money have the means to collect.

Stream-ripping is far from being extinguished, and the war on piracy is not likely to end anytime soon. The battle for artists to be compensated for their work has raged for decades, but hopefully, the end of Convert2MP3 pushes a few more pirates toward a legitimate music consumption.
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Industry News News

Music piracy rose 13% in the US last year, and stream-ripping is to blame.

Despite reports claiming otherwise, a new study from a marketing research company reveals that the war on piracy far from over.

Despite reports claiming otherwise, a new study from a marketing research company reveals that the war on piracy far from over.

The music industry breathed a sigh of release last September after global piracy platform MUSO released a report claiming that piracy was on the decline. The streaming age, it seemed, had finally converted thieves into consumers.

This week, however, a new study published by marketing research company MusicWatch claims otherwise.

In a blog post focused mainly on stream-ripping services, MusicWatch claimed to have tracked 17 million users downloading their music on websites from video platforms, including YouTube.  That’s up from 15 million from the same period two years ago.

The top 30% of stream-rippers also downloaded an average of 112 music files, the equivalent of 10 full music albums, over the course of the year.

Thanks to Stream-Ripping, Music Piracy Still a Scourge

The company wrote:

“That may not seem a lot in a world where streaming services hold millions of songs, but ask any rights holder how they feel about someone copying their works.  For a more vivid picture, imagine someone shoplifting 11 albums from Walmart or Best Buy!”

MusicWatch Blog, 2019

The question of why the spike occurred remains unanswered, but MusicWatch points the blame at search platforms such as Google for not taking the matter seriously. The company believes it is easy for anyone to find a stream-ripping service in a matter of clicks, and that files ripped from sites such as YouTube are seen as a replacement to mainstream music streaming services such as Spotify.

A quick search by the Haulix team proved their theory to be true:

Google and other search platforms are under fire for not doing more to prevent access to stream-ripping services like the ones seen here.

Additionally, the study from MusicWatch revealed that stream-rippers are also more likely to participate in other forms of unsanctioned music sharing.  These include downloading songs from unlicensed music apps and sharing songs on digital lockers or file-sharing sites.

They’re also more likely to go to the movies, play video games, and subscribe to video streaming platforms, like Hulu and Netflix.  That, says the marketing research company, amplifies the risk of piracy in each category. If they’ll steal music they don’t own, why wouldn’t they do the same for films, tv, or video games?

Of the people surveyed by MusicWatch, 68% of stream-rippers in the U.S. are aged between 13 and 34.  A slightly higher number of males pirate when compared to women, 56% to 44%.  The average household income of stream-rippers is between $75,000 and $199,000.  Only 34% are full or part-time students, which strongly suggests that professionals are also downloading music for free.

As for solutions to these problems, MusicWatch concludes their study by reiterating the need to fight back against stream-ripping platforms.

“If [stream-rippers] pirate music, they’ll likely also take movies, TV shows, and other forms of intellectual property.  Discouraging stream-ripping isn’t just good for music; it’s good for the entire entertainment ecosystem.”

There have been several lawsuits filed against stream-ripping websites in recent years, while other stream-ripping platforms have received cease and desist letters. Until action is taken to block or otherwise remove stream-ripping sites as a whole, the entertainment industry will have to wage war against the services on a site-by-site basis.

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Stream ripping has lead to a surge in piracy, but Haulix has a solution

Bad news on the piracy front. According to a new report from MUSO, stream ripping from sites like YouTube and Soundcloud has lead to a surge in music piracy.

In the first nine months of this year – that’s January 1 to September 30 – there were 7.2bn visits to copyright-infringing stream-ripping sites around the globe. That is a 60% rise over the same period in 2015. 

The websites responsible for allowing such rampant piracy to be carried out are numerous, but none are more well known than YouTube-mp3.org. The owner of that site was actually sued by all three major labels last month. This has not caused the site’s competitors to run and hide however, which is disappointing.

There is good news. Well, good news for those of you who use Haulix to promote your new and unreleased music.

Haulix uses a custom system for injecting watermarks that extends to streams hosted on our service. If someone rips the audio from a Haulix stream, or from a YouTube video using a watermarked track taken from Haulix, our system can pull the watermarks from those rips and identify the person responsible for the leak. Pirates can try to transcode and re-upload files they originally received from Haulix, but the watermarks will still remain.

We wish we could say we had a solution to ending rip services like YouTube-mp3, but until that time our watermarks can help identify music pirates and ensure they are never allowed access to music again. 

Sign up today and experience the Haulix difference for yourself.

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