I’ve been running an exit relay for about 3 days and, sure enough, some BitTorrent bugger caused sh3lls.net to send me a DMCA nastygram:

We have got the following complain, please remove all illegal torrents immediately from your server:

Evidentiary Information Title: Suits (TV) Infringement Source: BitTorrent Initial Infringement Timestamp: 17 Oct 2013 22:06:17 GMT Recent Infringement Timestamp: 17 Oct 2013 22:06:17 GMT Infringing Filename: Suits Season 3 Episode 6 (The Other Time) (HDTV x264)-ASAP (1GBps SeedBox).mp4 URL if applicable: Infringing File size: 364405400 Infringers IP Address: 64.32.14.34 Bay ID: 7fbb4256bfca558d5a809b9f6536b5fd5e4e782d|364405400 Port ID: 33788

I followed through with the templates provided by the Tor Project as a response to the DMCA takedown notification. A day later, the ISP sent me this:

Dear Christopher Whether you run Tor or not, we even told you in past, it's your responsibility to stop all abuse If Tor is causing it, stop the program Tor on your server, if we get another complain we will have to suspend/terminate your services

tor always always gets lots and lots of abuse and complains

Update us within 24 hours

Thanks

I was never provided with the full text of the original DMCA complaint, so I was unable to respond. Furthermore, I was never “even told…in the past” that I had to stop all abuse caused by Tor. Tor is not singled out in the ToS or AUP. And I was certainly never told anything in the past about abuse and Tor specifically. As I said, first warning. Then there’s the “tor always always gets lots and lots of abuse and complains [sic]”. Which is kind of bizarre, because their position on tor seems a bit cagey. Does the claim about lots of abuse mean they won’t allow exit nodes? Or is that just a “hint” that I’d be better off not trying to run it?

And this is an ISP I picked from the good list.

Suggestions are welcome. I’m running with the default exit node policy, which should block most of the abuse-laden ports. BitTorrent’s a little harder to deal with. I’ve no qualms working with the ISP to mitigate their concerns, but I’m not sensing their returning the same spirit of cooperation.

.cpj