Darknets: The Future of Peer-to-peer (p2p) File Sharing

Last June, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that file sharing networks such as Grokster, Kazaa and Limewire could be sued if their members pirated digital music, digital videos, and software. However, the Supreme Court may have gotten much more than they bargained for when issuing this decision. Instead of users finally deciding to go legitimate and purchase their content through places like the iTunes Music store, they are fighting back with technology.

Although the “out in the open” networks were being highly targeted, many peer-to-peer traders realized they could continue sharing files if they did so in secret. In response to the decision, some programmers decided they would make so-called “Darknets” or peer to peer networks that are private, invitation only, and are invisible to state of the art sleuthing. Eric Cole, of Lockheed Martin recently told CIO.com, his definition of a darknet, “a darknet as a group of individuals who have a covert, dispersed communication channel.” They have become an attractive way for pirates to get around the entertainment industry’s lust for prosecuting digital pirates.

In a hypothetical darknet, a programmer would send the software to his or her friends, and they would all connect to a peer to peer network that was invisible to the outside world. Those friends would also be able to send the software to their friends, and they would be able to get on the network. However, if a network became very successful and very large, everyone, including the entertainment industries would know about it, and then they would be able to access the network and begin litigating.