Monthly Archives: December 2019

Singapore ISPs are Blocking Pirate Sites

Posted on by

Singapore introduced changes to copyright laws that enable ISPs to ban pirate sites after getting a lot of heat from the holders in 2014. It took some time for the authorities to keep up with the issue of online piracy following the passage of these amendments.
In 2016, the MPAA requested that Solarmovie.ph become, as a result of the High Court Order, the first pirate website that the ISPs are blocking. After that, a further major break took place until May 2018, when another round of high court rulings ordered ISPs to ban specific pirate sites. This was a consequence of another lawsuit by the MPAA earlier 2018.

As a result, the access to 53 Pirate sites in 154 domains was blocked by large ISPs. These include The Pirate Bay, KickassTorrents, Solarmovie, etc. In addition to the Singtel, StarHub, M1, ViewQwest and MyRepublic direct court orders is adhered to by all major ISPs.
Under Singapore law, the High Court must ensure that, before issuing a blocking order for every website, all conditions are met. Sites such as YouTube, for example, involve infringements at certain rates of copyright but their main purpose is not to infringe copyright. That is why YouTube is not identified while Pirate Bay is banned.

Singapore seems to have opted to be a part of the global piracy war effort. This does not, of course, mean that people cannot find a way to remove a blocking order from such pages. Under this situation, many people in Singapore start to count on VPNs to unblock websites that are blocked by the ISPs. As most VPN service providers have servers located around the globe, by connecting to a VPN, users are allowed to be connected to the Internet outside their countries, which will further allow them to have access to the Internet content of the countries they connect to. That is why VPNs are frequently used for bypassing geo-restrictions and unblocking websites.

Teensafe is Suffering a Data Leakage

Posted on by

Teen monitoring app named TeenSafe has recently leaked from one of its servers thousands of usernames and passwords. User Identities, passwords, and Apple ID information have been stolen. The app developers believed that TeenSafe information is encrypted, but the data somehow leaked in plaintext format that calls into question the integrity of the device. The data has been hacked from one of TeenSafe’s cloud servers designed for user data management.

TeenSafe is a parental control app that allows parents’ access to the web browser, profile, social media records, and text message logs of their children. All these high sensitive materials are now available to people behind the hack. British security researcher Robert Wiggins has found two compromised TeenSafe servers. Nevertheless, it appears that only one site has confidential user information.

After the accident, a TeenSafe spokeswoman issued a statement. He claimed that one of the servers affected was shut down and notified to all users affected. During the last three months, more than 10,000 accounts were affected. The developers have informed themselves of no compromising photos, notes and location data. However, both parents’ and children’s email addresses have been leaked, so hackers could identify users. All iOS and Android are available and no kid’s permission is needed, which has impacted users of both apps.

If double-factor authentication is activated, then the app will not work, this situation of not being able to have double-factor authentication makes the app vulnerable. Anyone who has access to an E-mail account password can login and access to private information in the corresponding e-mail accounts.

Teensafe’s technicians are now working on improving the security level of their servers. Whereas, as for users, there are things they need to do at their side. It can be helpful for them to use a VPN while using the online Apps, so the information they send to the apps will be encrypted. VPNs are not only used for unblocking websites, they also play a great role in protecting online data and guaranteeing Internet security.