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A French court ordered Google, Cloudflare and Cisco to poison their DNS resolvers to avoid bypassing blocking measures, targeting around 117 pirated sports streaming domains. The move is another escalation against piracy for the Canal+ channel, which also has permission to completely deindex sites from search engine results.
In France, where laws including site blocking and similar anti-piracy measures were introduced, entertainment giant Canal+ appears determined to make the most of them.
Like similar broadcasters with lucrative sports rights to exploit, Canal+ has a subset of viewers who prefer to consume from pirate sources that charge much less, or even nothing at all.
To maximize its current site-blocking efforts through local ISPs, the French broadcaster has now taken the next logical, if controversial, step up the site-blocking ladder.
DNS manipulation at local ISP level
In 2023, Canal+ went to court in France to tackle pirate sports streaming sites including Footybite.co, Streamcheck.link, SportBay.sx, TVFutbol.info and Catchystream.com. The broadcaster said that since subscribers of local ISPs access pirate sites using their services, ISPs should prevent them from doing so.
When the decision favored Canal+, ISPs, including Orange, SFR, OutreMer Tรฉlรฉcom, Free and Bouygues Tรฉlรฉcom, had to implement technical measures. Since ISPs have their own DNS resolvers for use by their own customers, these were configured to provide inauthentic responses to deny access to the sites in question.
In response, increasingly savvy Internet users who had not already done so simply changed their settings to use different DNS providers (Cloudflare, Google, and Cisco) whose resolvers had not been tampered with; at least not yet.
One more step up the ladder: public DNS tampering
Using third-party DNS providers to bypass blocking is not uncommon, which is why Canal+ last year took legal action against three popular public DNS providers: Cloudflare (1.1.1.1), Google (8.8.8.8) and Cisco (208.69.38.205), demanding measures similar to those implemented by French ISPs.
Tampering with the public DNS is a step too far for many Internet advocates, but for major rights holders, if the law can be changed to allow it, that's what will happen. In this case, Article L333-10 of the French Sports Code (active in January 2022) seems capable of adapting to almost anything.
When โserious and repeated violationsโ occur by a โpublic online communication serviceโ whose main objective is the unauthorized broadcast of sports competitions, rights holders can demand โall proportionate measures that can prevent or put an end to it.โ to this infraction, against any person contributing to remedying it.โ
Google, Cloudflare, Cisco Ordered to Prevent Circumvention
Last month the Paris judicial court issued two decisions; one about Premier League matches and the other about the Champions League. The orders instruct Google, Cloudflare and Cisco to implement measures similar to those in place at local ISPs. To protect Canal+'s rights, the companies must prevent French Internet users from using their services to access some 117 pirated domains.
According to a French publication the informedwho broke the news, Google lawyer Sรฉbastien Proust analyzed figures published by the government anti-piracy agency Arcom and concluded that the effect on piracy rates, if any, is likely to be minimal.
Starting with a group of all users who use alternative DNS for any reason, users of pirate sites (especially sites that broadcast the matches in question) were isolated from the rest. Users of both VPN and third-party DNS were excluded from the group, as DNS blocking is not effective against VPNs.
Proust found that the number of users who could be affected by DNS blocking on Google, Cloudflare and Cisco amounts to 0.084% of the total population of French Internet users. Citing a recent survey, which found that only 2% of those facing lockdowns simply give up and find no other means to bypass them, he came to an interesting conclusion.
โ2% of 0.084% is 0.00168% of Internet users! In absolute terms, that would represent a small group of about 800 people in all of France!
The court rejected the arguments against the blockade
Like other courts presented with the same arguments, the Paris court said the number of people using alternative DNS to access sites and the simplicity of switching DNS are irrelevant.
Canal+ owns the rights to the broadcasts and if you wish to request a precautionary blocking measure, you have the legal right to do so.
The court also dismissed DNS providers' claim that their services are not covered by the legislation.
Google says it intends to comply with the order. As part of the original issue in 2023, domains were already required to be deindexed from search results under the same law.
At least in theory, this means that those who bypassed the original blocks using these alternative DNS services will be back to square one and facing blocks again.
Since bypassing this set of blocks will be as easy as bypassing the original ones, the question arises as to what measures Canal+ will demand next and from whom.
| Paris Judicial Court | Channel+ | Cloudflare/Google/Cisco | |
| first division | UEFA Champions League |
|---|---|
| footybite.cc | footybite.tv |
| footybite.io | hesgoal.today |
| hesgoal.name | redditsoccerstreams.org |
| pirlotv.application | rsoccerstreams.net |
| reddit-soccerstreams.com | futbolstreams.futbol |
| redditsoccerstreams.tv | footballstreamshd.com |
| streameast.gg | totalsporteks.net |
| volokit.to | sportsurge.application |
| totalsportek.ac | redditsoccerstreams.xyz |
| footballstreamlinks.com | hesgoals.up |
| name.football | hdmatch.club |
| lacasadeltikitaka.net | bitstreams.net |
| streamseast.ai | futbolvivo.sx |
| bestsolaris.com | footybite.uno |
| radamel.icu | techclips.net |
| sports.f1livestream.top | sports.f1livestream.top |
| backfirstwo.site | reddit.soccerstreamshd.com |
| reddit.volokit.to | extra time.live |
| hitsports.pro | streameast.top |
| tvhd.tutvlive.site | footballstreams.app |
| dotsport.live | freeviplive.com |
| dotsport1.com | fapxy.info |
| elkoora.live | 1l1l.to |
| fel3ardaa.com | futbolonlinetv.club |
| golkoralive.com | hesgoal.mundo |
| silapathikaram.com | hesgoaltv.me |
| cainsoffering.net | sporthd.me |
| golkoralive.live | cdnz.uno |
| kkooralives.com | ivesoccer.sx |
| koora-live.io | livetv705.me |
| kooralivs.com | livetv706.me |
| kora4live.net | pirlotvhd.online |
| live-kooora.com | reddirectatv.uno |
| livekooora.online | footballstreams100.io |
| live-kooora-tv.com | redcardenvivo.me |
| live-kooora-tv.net | redcardtvhd.com |
| livekoora.io | stream.pajitotv.info |
| live-koora.online | hesgoaled.com |
| livetv707.me | 1.ivesoccer.sx |
| livetv708.me | embx214129.apl275.me |
| monlive.info | emb.apl275.me |
| Rojadirectaenvivotv.me | embx214161.apl275.me |
| reddirectaes.org | stream.rodrixtv.info |
| awtsport.com | fk9.pw |
| live7.pro | m.soccerstreams100.io |
| sportsonline.so | ovo-line.com |
| 4koora.elkoora.live | sportschamp.fun |
| f.fel3ardaa.com | givereddit.eu |
| v3.sportsonline.sx | streamseast.ai |
| kora.live-koora.live | tazz.tv |
| alkora.golkoralive.live | embx214374.apl275.me |
| kooralive.koora-live.io | hd.espnv2.online |
| m.koora-live.io | embx210801.apl275.me |
| syria-live.us | |
| 4kooralive.live-kooora.com | |
| 5kooralive.live-kooora.com | |
| tvkoora.livekooora.online | |
| mypanlss.tienda | |
| koora.live-kooora-tv.net | |
| v2.sportsonline.so | |
| kora.livekoora.io | |
| koras.live-koora.online | |
| embx214129.apl274.me | |
| embx210130.apl276.me | |
| capodeportes.run | |
| sports-stream.info | |
| topstreams.me | |
| sports.chelsealivestream.com | |
| sportsleading.online | |
