Two of the most prominent pirated streaming sites, MethStreams and the most recent iteration of CrackStrea,ms were taken offline on Monday. This marks the latest instance of unlawful streaming services going dark in response to a coordinated effort by leagues, media companies, regulators, and law enforcement.

Last month, ESPN NFL insider Adam Schefter shared a Thursday Night Football game clip from the unlawful streaming site MethStreams, which garnered some mainstream attention. A source informed Front Office Sports that the film, which featured a MethSteams watermark, was extracted from an alternative Twitter account and that Schefter was not viewing the Amazon game on MethStreams.

On Monday, Schefter responded to the news of MethStreams’ demise with a neutral face emoji in jest.

It is unclear as to why the pirating sites have gone silent. However, the Motion Picture Association-backed Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment assisted in dismantling one of the world’s largest live sports piracy organizations earlier this month.

In a press release, the organization announced that it had successfully requested that the administrators of a Vietnam-based ring, responsible for 812 million visits in 2024, transfer dozens of domains to ACE.

CrackStreams’ previous domain was among the 138 domains forcibly removed.

𝗕𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗞𝗜𝗡𝗚: Popular sport streaming sites Methstreams and Crackstreams have been taken down and are no longer in use.

Millions of sports fans will be impacted by this. pic.twitter.com/oRmQ3Vl0VH

— Dov Kleiman (@NFL_DovKleiman) December 30, 2024

Motion Picture Association executive Larissa Knapp announced the downing of the Vietnam-based sites, stating, “ACE’s live sports members face a unique threat when it comes to digital piracy, as live sports broadcasts lose substantial commercial value once the game ends.”

The takedown “serves as a warning to piracy operators worldwide, including those involved in live sports piracy, that ACE will identify and terminate their illegal operations.”

Faster Illegal Streaming Takedowns

In a joint letter to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office last year, the NFL, NBA, and UFC stated that illegal broadcasts were causing the global sports industry to lose “up to $28 billion in additional potential annual revenue.”

When illicit streams emerged in the early 2000s, pay-per-view events were the primary targets. However, the emergence of pirated sites worldwide was largely due to the increased cord-cutting in recent years and the availability of sports content on streaming services such as ESPN+, Peacock, and other paid services.

In addition, they developed an illegal bundle that allows subscribers to access thousands of entertainment channels and live sports content for a nominal monthly charge through pirated paid websites.

Although end users in the United States violate the law by viewing illicit streams, investigators and prosecutors prioritize the individuals responsible for those streams.

In June, a federal jury in Las Vegas convicted five men of operating a paid piracy streaming site. In November, federal prosecutors in New York indicted two brothers for allegedly earning over $7 million operating 247TVStream, another paid pirate service.

February is the targeted date for the sentencing of the Las Vegas case.

It is not immediately apparent whether ACE was involved in the shutdown of MethStreams and CrackStreams, so contacting ACE was not an immediate process.

ACE’s Dec. 19 termination announcement included crackstreams.dev as one of the sites. On the same day, the individual reported on Discord that another CrackStreams domain had been “locked down by our domain provider.” This individual is purportedly responsible for MethStreams and CrackStreams.

CrackStreams identified itself as a “free live sports streaming website” that provided users with stolen sports streaming content.

The site’s domain was altered to crackstreams.in, as is frequently the case with piracy sites. On Monday, the same Discord user named “methstreams” announced they were “taking a break from live streaming.” Methstreams did not respond to a Discord direct message.

Tucows, the world’s second-largest domain registrar, registered methstreams.com and crackstreams.in. A representative from Tucows informed FOS that the company had not taken any action against either domain.

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(VOR News) – The millions of small businesses who depend on the social media app TikTok for short videos to help them expand their operations would be significantly impacted. These businesses would be greatly impacted if TikTok were to be banned.

Desiree Hill, the owner of Crown’s Corner Mechanic in Conyers, Georgia, took the initiative to launch her own business after working as a mobile mechanic in the past. She was able to start a brick and mortar business with five employees and 9,000 square feet eighteen months ago.

This was made possible by her growing popularity, which enabled her to publish videos of her work on TikTok and spread the word about it. “Every day, I receive at least two to three customers who have seen me on TikTok, watched my videos, and want to become a customer,” she informed the news crew.

“I also get customers who have seen me on TikTok.”

Despite TikTok’s relatively recent launch in 2016, small business owners utilize the site in a multitude of ways. These include expanding their clientele, promoting and marketing their brand, and selling goods directly from the internet.

Small businesses that use TikTok would lose more than $1 billion in income in a single month if the ban were to be enforced, according to estimates provided by the company itself.

The Justice Department has ordered ByteDance, the Chinese app’s parent company, to sell TikTok by January 19 or risk the app being blocked in the US government. Security issues with the app were the reason for the order. In January, the Supreme Court will meet to consider the matter and render a ruling.

A plea to postpone the case has been filed with the Supreme Court by Donald Trump, the incoming president who will take office on January 20.

Small businesses will need to move their clientele to other platforms in order to continue operating if a ban is implemented. Other options to think about are YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, and Snapchat Shorts. The likelihood that brands already have a presence there is high, which is a really positive development.

However, compared to other social networking sites, it can be more challenging to communicate with teenagers who have made TikTok their main social networking tool.

Another method is to build an extensive database of clients who have voluntarily provided their contact details, including phone numbers and email addresses. This enables business owners to communicate directly with their clients and offer them promotional materials and marketing messages.

TikTok will reach more people than any other website.

In contrast to the preceding assertion, Hill makes this one. She went on to say that even though she is active on YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook, it is not the same as being on Facebook. This, she admitted, is the case.

She expressed her concern with the following statement: “I am worried because there is no preparation for this.” I would either lose a sizable portion of my business or my future growth potential if I were to lose TikTok. For me, one of these outcomes would be catastrophic.

This may be specifically attributed to the significant influence TikTok has on my clientele and how I interact with prospective clients.

Mommy and I both: Crystal Lister is the owner and operator of The Listers, a business with its main office located in Cypress, Texas. The organization offers interactive seminars that focus on learning STEM subjects.

However, her report claims that TikTok is more convenient. She is also working on moving the videos to YouTube and the previews on Instagram Reels so that people may find YouTube.

“It is going to be a challenge because we are losing kind of all the functionality you want,” she claimed when asked about the possible consequences of TikTok’s ban. The capacity to produce movies and spread the word via social media are two examples of this specific feature. We will therefore need to use a large number of additional websites in order to complement what TikTok accomplished on a single platform.

SOURCE: AP

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AT&T and Verizon Attacked by Salt Typhoon Hackers Affiliated with China

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(VOR News) – Based on the revelations provided by these firms, a hacking gang at AT&T known as Salt Typhoon—which has ties to China—has been targeted at many big American telecoms including AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc.

Both companies have said that at the time their networks are safe and secure and that they are not susceptible to any future threats.

With its headquarters in Dallas, AT&T made the news in a statement released on Saturday stating that hackers sought access to data pertaining to foreign intelligence.

Verizon, with its headquarters in New York City, claimed that the attackers had aimed at “a limited number of prominent clients in government and politics.”

This AT&T line continued from the one that came before it.

“After extensive efforts to address this incident, we can confirm that Verizon has contained the activities related to it,” Verizon Chief Legal Officer Vandana Venkatesh said. “Verizon has effectively stopped the related events for this particular incident.”

Saying “We have not observed any threat actor activity within Verizon’s network for an extended period,” Venkatesh said Verizon has said that the issue has been fixed and has also included a statement declaring that this information has been confirmed by an independent cybersecurity agency.

Both of the most well-known telecom companies worldwide have committed themselves to cooperate with the authorities and notify everyone whose data might have been leaked.

“At this time, we have not identified any activity on our networks that is linked to nation-state actors,” said an AT&T spokesman in a second remark.

According to the company, who believe to have ties to the People’s Republic of China, the targets of the assaults were a small group of people who have been found to have contacts with foreign government intelligence services. Notices have been sent to anyone affected by the occurrence. These alerts were shared in line with the pertinent authorities keeping an eye on the matter.

The Wall Street Journal revealed in October that several telecom companies, including AT&T and Verizon, had been hacked. This made the general people aware of the Salt Typhoon breach.

It is believed that the hackers gained access to federal government networks used for the purpose of obtaining court-granted wiretap warrants.

T-Mobile USA Inc. has seen odd activity on network-level routers that resembles the tactics Salt Typhoon used against the company, despite the fact that knowledge about the hack since that time is lacking.

No consumer data was stolen, but T-Mobile claims it put AT&T out of business.

A notification released by the White House on Friday indicated that nine separate telecommunications companies suffered from the onslaught resulting from the Salt Typhoon.

Though officials from the United States have not named all affected carriers, industry analysts have concluded that the breach is noteworthy.

Recently, Vice President Joe Biden’s staff met with AT&T’s Chief Executive Officer, John Stankey, among other members of the telecom industry to go over industry inadequacies. The assembly aimed to evaluate the advantages and drawbacks of the sector.

Officials have cautioned that it could take a significant period of time to totally eradicate the threat and stated they do not know exactly the extent of the attack, including the count of Americans targeted.

China has repeatedly denied any role in the assaults and any guilt for them, claiming it has no bearing on them. Conversely, security researchers believe that Salt Typhoon, a sophisticated cyber-espionage operation unearthed by threat analysts employed by Microsoft, carried out the attack.

This event has sparked concerns about the security of important communications infrastructure in the United States, therefore stressing the need of improving the degree of government-private sector cooperation

SOURCE: CS

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