Just to get the legal stuff done and dealt with; file sharing copyrighted material is illegal and by doing so you could be fined, imprisoned and given a criminal record. The following information you use at your own risk and I take no responsibility for your own stupidity.

As of recent companies have been cracking down on file sharing and are targeting those that share copyrighted material, rather than those that download it. By getting rid of the source then they stop the downloader’s because there is nowhere to download from.

ISP’s in the UK are now tracking what you share and if they see you sharing copyrighted material you can see a £500 fine come through your letter box. They are hoping that with a small fine you will pay it and it will deter your from doing it again. If you refuse to pay they may take you to court and you could end up with a much heavier fine!

So what can you do?

1) Use an ISP that is not well known, find an ISP that is relatively small and hasn’t had much media coverage. Larger ISP’s that are well known are always the first to be targeted by the law and are always under the watchful eye of big brother.

2) Try not to share new releases, try only sharing material that has been available for some time. ISP’s will set up filters to pick up on latest releases that everyone is trying to get their hands on.

3) Try and keep your bandwidth usage as low as possible. By sharing a huge amount of material your ISP will most definitely pick up on this and they will be wondering why you are using so much bandwidth and therefore they will start investigating what you are doing.

4) Use sharing programs that has some method of encryption. Many programs out there will set up a secure an encrypted connection between you and the person you are sharing with. By doing this you ISP only sees encrypted data and they won’t know what you are sharing.

5) Change the filename of what you are sharing. If you keep the original name then ISP’s are going to pick this up in their filters.

I think that just about covers it. If anyone else has some tips or advice they would like to add then leave a comment.

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