Blizzard sends DMCA takedown to Stealthbot host's host

[Mangix]

In Blizzard's latest attempt to close down Battle Net bot projects entirely; today March 16th @ 11:20pm Stealth received an email from his web host informing him that the StealthBot installer was to be immediately removed. Although a 48 hour grace period was extended before this action needed to be complied with it does look as though StealthBot 2.6 will need to be removed from the local server.

Stealth will be contacting Blizzard tomorrow to determine on what grounds Blizzard is demanding this action. The entire StealthBot staff will be working furriously to correct any problems with the project and bring to you a new StealthBot which does not infringe on there product rights in any way.

At this time we request that you the users help us persuade Blizzard from this action. If you could take a few momments of your time to send an email to Blizzard ([email protected]) and express how this action will effect your Battle Net experience we would greatly appreciate it.

-StealthBot Staff

[Kp edit: changed title.  Left post text alone.  Old title of "WHYY" (more Ys) sucked.]

[QwertyMonster]

Omfg, Blizzard. Why now? They've let bots go on for ages, until now?!

[Stealth]

I have yet to receive an actual copy of the e-mail request. I assume it's similar to those received by BNet.cc and MadzBots in the past.

I am very disappointed in Blizzard. They went over my head, over my webhost's head, and send their request directly to the datacenter that my webhost uses, The Planet in Dallas. Therefore I have yet to see this e-mail and cannot verify its authenticity.

As soon as I have contact information for a legal affairs specialist at Blizzard I will be calling them to inquire as to what grounds they have for demanding my takedown of StealthBot. I will also attempt to work with them to bring StealthBot into compliance with any kind of copyright infringement claims they make.

As far as I know, StealthBot's imitation of the client-side Battle.net protocol is legal reverse-engineering pending the outcome of Blizzard vs. BNetD. This appears to be simply a bully tactic by Blizzard.

Does anyone have suggestions as to how I should go about handling this? My course of action right now is as follows:

1. Wait for the e-mail to arrive from The Planet. It names a specific file (my installer) as being a DMCA violation.

2. Take down the file. (I can simply disable my mirror, as several others exist and were not specified in the complaint to my knowledge.)

3. Call Blizzard and speak to their legal department regarding the request. Find out if they have any grounds at all for making a case against my software. Emphasize that I'm a minor (17).

4. Talk to Blizzard's legal department or some other segment of their organization and see what I can do to bring StealthBot into compliance with their wishes.

5. Contact the EFF and inform them of the situation, see what their suggestions are.

6. Post the e-mail in its entirety on chillingeffects.org.

I don't have the resources to fight this in court, nor the money to settle it outside of court. If it comes to it, I will simply end the project. I hope Blizzard won't make me do that.

[Blaze]

Sorry to hear this Stealth.

@Mangix, change the title of this post.

[iago]

Yeah, it's a dumb title

Stealth -- until you actually get into contact with Blizzard, there's no way of knowing that it's actually them.  It would be extremely easy for somebody who doesn't like you to send an email to your host (or datacenter) posing as Blizzard.

My solution: host all your files outside of the United States!

[Hdx]

Are you sure that is a correct E-mail address? I sent a e-mail wanting to talk to them. And it came back as a mailer deamon.
I'd also like to get some stats, How many connections per day does BNLS get for the BotID Stealth?
Is there a way I can get that information? (Nothing to do with cdkeys or anything -.-  jsut connection on the ID.)

This could mean that some dammen script kiddie used a pathetic SMTP server to send a false e-mail. Check the e-mail headers and tell me what they are. (Those can also be forges cuz Battle.net servers allow for SMTP connetions sadly)
~-~(HDX)~-~

[QwertyMonster]

Are you sure that is a correct E-mail address? I sent a e-mail wanting to talk to them. And it came back as a mailer deamon.
~-~(HDX)~-~

Yeah same. Ive got a message saying a failure sending it? Stealth are you sure you got the email from "[email protected]" ?

[Falcon[anti-yL]]

He didn't get the email, his host's datacenter got it.

[QwertyMonster]

He didn't get the email, his host's datacenter got it.

Oh, sorry i didnt know. I thought Stealth got it. My wrong, sorry.

[Soul Taker]

Does the installer contain any "hash files"?

[Arta]

Yes. Good question. Or any other Blizzard game files, graphics - anything like that. Chat icons, perhaps?

[Eric]

Does the installer contain any "hash files"?

No.  StealthBot.net does not host these files either, however links to sites that do are all over the place.

[MyndFyre]

Yes. Good question. Or any other Blizzard game files, graphics - anything like that. Chat icons, perhaps?

It does contain the chat icons, as they are built into the client.

[Arta]

If you're distributing their icons, that's infringement (no question). You can probably get away with downloading icons.bni and parsing it.

[Stealth]

If you're distributing their icons, that's infringement (no question). You can probably get away with downloading icons.bni and parsing it.

Beyond those icons, however, there really isn't much that's infringing. I was speaking with Doug (Imhotep[Nu]) and came to the following conclusions:

- We can modify the images to break that infringement if necessary
- The most likely reason for their action was this change between 2.5 and 2.6:

- Added PGTour rank icons for compatibility with their private server (thanks Pat)

They clearly don't like privately-operated Battle.net servers, so I suppose that change can be construed as a move in support of these servers.


Again, 100% speculation as I still have yet to see the e-mails themselves.