'Darknets' to cloak identities of computer file swappers

SAN FRANCISCO -- Internet rebels on Tuesday began testing a new weapon that threatens to scuttle efforts to stop illicit online music swapping.

Internet privacy activists at Freenet Project posted word on their website that they were looking for savvy programmers to test a refined version "darknet" software designed to keep file swappers anonymous.

Freenet's call for stealth software test pilots came slightly more than a month after the US Supreme Court struck a blow for the entertainment industry by equating internet sharing of music with "garden variety theft."

The court ruled that services, such as Grokster, that abet rogue swapping of music can be held accountable as accomplices.

The decision was proclaimed a landmark victory by Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

"There will always be a degree of piracy online, as there is piracy on the street," said Jonathan Lamy of the RIAA.

"Our objective is to bring piracy under sufficient control where legitimate services can compete and flourish."

Hip technophiles tuned into life in Silicon Valley and San Francisco scoffed, saying file swappers would only get sneakier.

Freenet's new software was heralded as "scalable," which means it would enable large numbers of stealth users to freely share files online, Doug Tygar, a computer professor at the University of California, Berkeley, told Agence Franc-Presse.

Previous versions of secret file sharing software were seen as manageable by the recording industry because the programs were unwieldy and limited in the numbers of people who could use them.

"Even if this version of Freenet doesn't met its goals, I can assure you they will continue to refine their software," Tygar said.

"It is just a matter of time before anonymous file sharing networks become available."

The recording industry will need to evolve to keep its grip on copyrighted material, Tygar said.

Copyright holders must build better technological locks to guard their property, he said.

"The onus is on the people producing copyrighted material to protect that material," Tygar said.

"That has always been the case," he continued. "It was the case when the Xerox was invented, and you might argue it was the case when the pencil and paper were invented."

The test software is "neither user-friendly nor secure at this point," Freenet reported on its website.

The project's stated intent is "making a globally scalable friend-to-friend darknet which eliminates a swathe of attacks and makes Freenet far more usable in the short term in hostile regimes such as China and the Middle East."

China uses Internet "fire walls" to block secret sharing of computer files on the Internet, Tygar said. The US recording industry endorses similar online obstacles, Tygar said.

If Freenet's darknet software lives up to its promise, then "techniques used today to trace individual users simply will not work," Tygar said.

"The only way to ensure that a democracy will remain effective is to ensure that the government cannot control its population's ability to share information, to communicate," the Freenet website philosophy page states.

"The core problem with copyright is that enforcement of it requires monitoring of communications, and you cannot be guaranteed free speech if someone is monitoring everything you say."