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Very curious about the legal implications if every site that I visit can transfer files to unknown peers in the background. P2P is, AFAIK, a big source of costly cease-and-desist orders in Germany. With WebTorrent, I guess I could tell the right holder to bring the matter to court and plausibly state that some malicious ad iframe must have distributed that MKV without my knowledge.


Not just that, but why wouldn't ads start using your bandwith for this sort of thing ? Do you get a legal claim for your bandwith costs (especially on mobile) against the site owner for doing this without your permission ?

Do you get a claim against your browser maker ?


Is there a difference between using bandwidth this way, or loading say 150MB image? (bandwidth costs wise)


I would certainly say yes. They're using your bandwidth to serve another one of their customers, for free, without compensating you in any way.

Whereas loading a 150MB image from their server is using their bandwidth (that they're paying for) to serve you.

Legally, I have no idea. Morally, it'd be nice if they at least asked and actually had a working site if you say "no".


Those cease and desist orders are toothless. You can either ignore them or write them a nice letter that you didn't violate the copyright and don't plan to in the future.


They aren't toothless if the only ISP in your city cuts you off.




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