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P2P study finds around 100 users responsible for majority of BitTorrent content
By Darren Quick
23:26 January 24, 2011
The BitTorrent peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing protocol was estimated by internet traffic management and analysis company ipoque to account for roughly 27 to 55 percent of all internet traffic as of February 2009 – much of it pirated software, music and video files. While the distributed nature of P2P networks sees millions of users sharing files every day, a new study to examine the behavior of users responsible for publishing files on the Mininova and The Pirate Bay portals reveals that a small group of around 100 users is responsible for the majority of content published over BitTorrent. Read More
Illegal peer-to-peer sharing of movies, music and software is currently estimated to comprise more than half the world's Internet traffic - and copyright holders are up in arms, saying that CD, movie and software sales are taking a devastating hit from the quick, convenient and anonymous piracy options the broadband age has opened up. Now, the UK is considering legislation that would see suspected illegal file sharers cut off altogether by their ISPs - despite the fact that the European Parliament recently rejected a similar plan from France, on the grounds that it contravened the modern citizen's fundamental right to access the Internet. Read More
