The Holy Grail of takedown tools is one that not only removes content, but keeps it down. Interestingly, 4shared, one of the world's most complained-about sites, offers a service provided by a Spotify-owned company to do just that. So why doesn't the BPI, who sent 6.7m 4shared complaints to Google, use it? PR reasons, 4shared believes.

There are hundreds of millions of pirate files inhabiting the Internet and it’s fair to say that many of those are music tracks. As a result, the world’s leading record labels, who together claim 90%+ of the market, spend significant sums making those files more awkward to find.

For sites like The Pirate Bay, which point-blank refuses to remove any torrents whatsoever, the labels have little option than to head off to Google. There the search giant will remove Pirate Bay links from its indexes so that users won’t immediately find them.

However, rather than engaging a link whack-a-mole, the best solution by far is to remove the content itself. Perhaps surprisingly, many of the world’s leading file-lockers (even ones labeled ‘rogue’ by the United States), allow copyright holders direct back-end access to their systems so they can remove content themselves. It doesn’t really get any fairer than that, and here’s the issue.

This week, while looking at Google’s Transparency Report, TF noticed that during the past month massive file-hosting site 4shared became the record labels’ public enemy number one. In just four weeks, Google received 953,065 requests for 4shared links to be taken down, the majority of them from record labels. In fact, according to Google the BPI has complained about 4shared a mind-boggling 6.75 million times overall.

So, is 4shared refusing to cooperate with the BPI, hence the group’s endless complaints to Google? That conclusion might make sense but apparently it’s not the case. In fact, it appears that 4shared operates a removal system that is particularly friendly to music companies, one that not only allows them to take content down, but also keep it down.

“Throughout the years 4shared developed several tools for copyright owners to protect their content and established a special team that reacts to copyright claims in timely manner,” 4shared informs TorrentFreak.

“We don’t completely understand BPI’s reasons for sending claims to Google instead of using our tools. From our point of view the best and most effective way for copyright holders to find and remove links to the content they own is to use our music identification system.”

To find out more, TF spoke with the BPI. We asked them to comment on 4shared’s takedown tools and in the light of their existence why they choose to target Google instead. After a few friendly back-and-forth emails, the group declined to comment on the specific case.

“We prefer to comment on our overall approach on search rather than on individual sites, which is to focus on known sources of wide scale piracy and to use a number of tools to tackle this problem,” a BPI spokesman explained.

“Notice-sending represents just one part of the measures available to us, along with site blocking and working with the Police to reducing advertising on copyright infringing sites.”

We asked 4shared to reveal other copyright holders using their system, but the site declined on privacy grounds. However, it’s clear that the BPI isn’t a user and 4shared have their own ideas why that might be.

“It’s possible that BPI goes for quantity not quality,” TF was told.

“If they are trying to increase the number of links in reports or for PR reasons, they probably use a bot to harvest and send links to Google despite the fact that such an approach may also result in false claims.”

The “PR” angle is an interesting one. Ever since Google began publishing its Transparency Report rightsholders have used it to demonstrate how bad the piracy problem is. Boosting those numbers certainly helps the cause.

But is it possible, perhaps, that the BPI doesn’t trust the 4shared system. They didn’t answer our questions on that front either but it seems unlikely since 4shared uses EchoPrint, a solution purchased by Spotify earlier this year.

“Our music identification system which is based on Echoprint technology will not only find all matching content but will also restrict sharing of all potential future uploads of such content,” 4shared concludes.

Take-down-and-stay-down is the Holy Grail for anti-piracy companies. It’s a solution being pushed for in the United States in the face of what rightsholders say is a broken DMCA. On that basis there must be a good reason for the BPI not wanting to work with 4shared and it has to be said that the company’s “PR” theory proves more attractive than most.

The volume of notices in Google’s Transparency Report provide believable evidence of large-scale infringement and it’s certainly possible that the BPI would prefer to have 4shared blocked in the UK than work with the site’s takedown tools.

We’ll find out the truth in the months to come.

It's hard to remain objective about downloading copyrighted material, for free. On the one hand, an artist or intellect who toils hundreds upon hundreds of hours to pump out a book is stolen from if his/her work is taken free of charge. The same goes for teams of entertainers, say musicians or movie makers. Then again, what movie makers and downloaders don't seem to understand alike is that all of this could be taken care of, very, very easily. It's already been around for a long, long time, too. The difference is using the internet to control it just as it is controlled in real life. It's not because it is around in real life that artists and intellects didn't or don't make money. It's also not because it is around that artists or intellects have all their work stolen and read when their work would never be stolen or read if people had to buy it. The sad fact about that truth is people steal what is valuable to them, generally speaking. If the work is not read or bought to begin with, money won't be lost if it is stolen. Although a consequentialist argument, it is beside my point. And, of course, the problem with my point is the same problem we see in agriculture. It is the same problem we see in the distribution of food and water around the world. The world has produced a great deal more food than it can consume for hundreds of years. Most of the world's water reserves are canalized freshwater rivers. The problem isn't the science and it's not the intellects or the consumers. It's the people in power (a select few who work in any particular industry) who hire lobbyists to exploit the law. You might think otherwise when you read it, but libraries have the same kinds of people working for them. We're able to print three dimensionally now, and to digitize information. Wouldn't you think that at least digitizing it would save trees and help the climate? Wouldn't you think that through a number of very substantial arguments humanity at large would reap the benefits? That, the implications would also encourage a digital age versus the age most people still live in? You'd be right to agree. But some elite persons who work in institutions that control information, such as libraries, and who are allied with other institutions, think that it is best to hold knowledge and entertainment hostage at the detriment of everyone out of fear that if everyone had access to public libraries no more money would be made. The truth is, sharing is perfectly legal. There are hundreds of thousands of millions of libraries all over the world, many of which are cultural goldmines. If that content were uploaded to the internet, and, trust me, it's not hard to do through civil servants who earn very good livings in several countries throughout the world, content could be borrowed at any time. A book isn't in your library? No problem, you still pay your taxes right? So, just make a request at your library for the book you need and voila, the book will arrive. Still not happy? Then open up a subscription at your national library, which should house millions of titles. On that note, such things as a world library could exist. Sounds like a good idea to me.

That would also take care of the music, in a lot of cases. Cinema would still have issues, but I think they deserve it. The tickets are outrageously expensive and once the movie has begun, in almost 100% of cases it's too inconvenient to leave. As well, there's the fact that we are forced to watch commercials for upwards of twenty minutes, on top of the ten to fifteen dollars already paid. Yes, that's right, people pay to watch commercials in my century. Fifteen to twenty years ago, people who took the risk could buy a ticket and at least expect a movie at the indicated time on the ticket. Sorry, not the consumer's problem. So, boycotting does seem a legitimate answer, and I think that'd be the best way to push online cinema. People think that if they are subscribed to sites that charge them a dime a film that they are "not stealing" but in those cases the artists don't see any of that money. At any rate, downloading of the sort is a result of lobbyists and politicians, plain and simple.