MobiTV Has A Totally Unsecured Feed, Threatens To Take Down HowardForums For Pointing That Out

from the under-what-law? dept

Fri, Mar 7th 2008 9:01am — Mike Masnick

If you follow the mobile communications world, you read HowardForums. It is, by far, the most comprehensive set of forums for anything having to do with mobile phones and mobile operators and applications. It's a fantastic resource... and MobiTV is trying to shut it down. MobiTV, if you don't know, provides a (fee-based) TV streaming service for mobile phones. It has partnered with various mobile operators to allow them to stream TV to mobile phones (a subject we were just talking about, noting how few people really are willing to pay). For some totally unknown reason, it appears that MobiTV actually broadcasts its television streams totally out in the open on a URL that anyone can access.

Someone noted this at Howard Forums and posted the information. There is no hacking going on. There is no encryption broken. There is nothing illicit whatsoever. The feed is a public URL. However, it appears that MobiTV thinks that because it did not properly secure its own feeds and left it on a public URL that somehow Howard Forums has broken the law. In a series of emails, MobiTV's corporate counsel has threatened to take down HowardForums and have contacted his web host (and are threatening to contact his registrar). It's difficult to see what sort of claim they have here. The URL is a public site. They did not attempt to lock it down in any way.

Broadband Reports has more on this story and thanks to reader CQD for pointing this out. You would think that with all the attention Julius Baer got last week for a similar situation, MobiTV's execs and lawyers would recognize how the Streisand Effect might come back to bite them.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: forums, howard forums, streisand effect, takedown, unsecured url
Companies: mobitv

26 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Chicken, 7 Mar 2008 @ 10:15am

Web Browser
Has this been adapted for a web browser that isn't on a mobile phone yet? I'm down with watching TV while in the office.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Noah Buddy, 7 Mar 2008 @ 10:25am

Idiocracy and Arrogance Strike Again
I don't know what is worse. Not locking the feed or being arrogant enough to believe nobody would use your public feed without paying.

That would be like putting a jumbo-tron in downtown Chicago and saying don't look at it unless you pay me first.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 7 Mar 2008 @ 10:35am

You can see the streams with the Windows VLC player to. So should everybody spread the MobiTV link everywhere so it doesn't matter if Howard Forums are taken down?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 7 Mar 2008 @ 10:35am

You can see the streams with the Windows VLC player to. So should everybody spread the MobiTV link everywhere so it doesn't matter if Howard Forums are taken down?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Pete, 7 Mar 2008 @ 10:56am

this is what the furor is about - Well, I found this in the Sprint forums and here we go:

qtv.mobitv.com/sprintTVlive.mcd

1. Copy and paste that link into the address bar.

2. Don't run it but save it to your computer.

3. Find it on your computer and OPEN it up. Select to open it with Internet Explorer or the browser of your choice.

4. There will be a whole bunch of links. Choose the channel you want to watch...

5. Get your LG Voyager and start up the browser.

6. Type one of the links into your Voyager and press OK!

There you go, live TV...
notice that it actually came from a sprint forum
[ link to this | view in thread ]
bubba, 7 Mar 2008 @ 11:19am

vlc
can you tell us how you got this to work with VLC on a laptop?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Woadan, 7 Mar 2008 @ 11:27am

Having read a bit on this, I have to wonder if the URLs weren;t maybe hacked. MobiTV is saying they don't publish them. And it may be that when it is fed to your phone, there is no URL. So, as the lead counsel for MobiTV was saying, it may be that the URLs were hacked, and maybe they have a valid case.

Having said all of that, once it's hacked, for better or for worse, it's toast. And yet again another reason why DRM will always fail.

Woadan
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Network Admin, 7 Mar 2008 @ 11:49am

Hmmm
I like how they still have the apache splash page up. When I hit the link above I get a forbidden notice.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 7 Mar 2008 @ 12:01pm

Re: vlc
Use the VLC watch stream setting and paste the address of the channel you want to (the RTSP address) watch. That's it. Supposedly Quicktime works too.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 7 Mar 2008 @ 12:02pm

Re:
When I had MobiTV on my Sprint phone it was just an application you ran. It came up like a cable box would. You could cruise through the channels and see what was on and pick what you wanted to watch. So you never used a browser or saw any URLs.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Hmmm, 7 Mar 2008 @ 12:12pm

If I keep my usernames and passwords in a file called UserInfo.txt in the root of my web server... but don't make that a public link... even go so far to disable spiders for that file... Is it "hacking" or illegal if someone points out that www.myserver.com/userinfo.txt contains a raw list of usernames and passwords for my web site!?

Personally I think not... it's shitty security and poor implementation on my end!

I tried VLC and the urls listed and it seems to not work at the moment, so maybe they actually did the correct thing and FIXED the hole instead of trying to hang the messenger!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Chronno S. Trigger, 7 Mar 2008 @ 12:16pm

Re: Hmmm
The page is for your phone. You have to have the rtsp:// URL to be able to run it in VLC (Can't get it to work) or quicktime (works for me).

The video quality is really crappy. The video itself is 1/2" wide and is blockey even then. I can't watch it.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Hmmm, 7 Mar 2008 @ 12:19pm

Wow this is stupid
If I keep my usernames and passwords in a file called UserInfo.txt in the root of my web server... but don't make that a public link... even go so far to disable spiders for that file... Is it "hacking" or illegal if someone points out that www.myserver.com/userinfo.txt contains a raw list of usernames and passwords for my web site!?

Personally I think not... it's shitty security and poor implementation on my end!

I tried VLC and the urls listed and it seems to not work at the moment, so maybe they actually did the correct thing and FIXED the hole instead of trying to hang the messenger!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
bob, 7 Mar 2008 @ 1:08pm

channel name="MSNBC" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="FOX News" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/8-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Discovery" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/3-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="TLC" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/4-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Animal Planet" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/63-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="NBC Comedy" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1500-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="ESPN Mobile TV" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/4103-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="NBC Sports Mobile" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1513-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Lipstick Jungle" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1508-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Maxx Look" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/48-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Toon World TV" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/28-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Access Hollywood" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1515-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Love Laffs" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/4104-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Bloomberg" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/52-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Tim Gunns Guide to Style" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1519-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="The Mic Hip Hop" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/910-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="V40 Hot Hits" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/911-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Totally 80s 90s" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/96-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Double Z Country" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/72-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="RandB Jamz" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/425-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Ritmo Caliente" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/97-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Chaos Extreme" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/913-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Shift Alternative" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/912-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="USA Mobile" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1503-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Bravo To Go" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1502-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="SCI FI Pulse Mobile" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1501-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Oxygen" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/58-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Discovery Mobile" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/53-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="A and E Mobile" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/17-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="The History Channel Mobile" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/19-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="NBC News Mobile" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/2-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Fashion TV" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/22-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Comedy Time" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/21-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="MAXX SPORTS" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com/50-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="IGN" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/59-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Bombones" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/74-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="CNET" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/23-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="CSPAN" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/30-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="CSPAN2" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/31-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Soulja Boy Tell Em TV" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/4100-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Ataku" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/83-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="D40 Digital Camera" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/1346-CDMA.sdp" type="video/3gpp"
channel name="Bank of America" href="rtsp://live.mobitv.com:554/4101-CDMA.sdp" type=
[ link to this | view in thread ]
bob, 7 Mar 2008 @ 1:09pm

^^^^Those links still work^^^^
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Brandon, 7 Mar 2008 @ 1:53pm

Re:
"^^^^Those links still work^^^^"

Now you've done it. They're going to have to threaten to shut TechDirt down now, too! Oh wait. Those links are also posted at least on Google and Digg as well, plus who knows how many other places. I guess they'll be threatening to shut down the entire internet!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
James, 7 Mar 2008 @ 2:10pm

Patent
You have infringed on my patent for displaying other people streaming media links.

Please pay me 10 million in royalties or I will sue you.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
TB, 7 Mar 2008 @ 4:05pm

MobiTV has been free without any real hacking for a while if you use the trial. The app creates a timestamp file in it's directory. Just go in and erase it and your trial starts again and you can keep using it for free.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
mike allen, 8 Mar 2008 @ 12:40am

why
would any one want TV on a mobile phone? screen is too small signal quirky even for text messages now a reciever on a usb stick and a laptop works great.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
pedro, 8 Mar 2008 @ 11:35am

backing down
Looks like the voices of protest forced the hand of these jokers. MobiTv is backing down on this one: http://www.news.com/8301-13578_3-9889025-38.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 8 Mar 2008 @ 12:37pm

free tv.. yay
[ link to this | view in thread ]
trial-out, 9 Mar 2008 @ 3:31pm

Is this only work in cell phone?
I have tried to copy and paste the rtsp to both my VLC player and Quick Time on my laptop and both doesn't seem working. Is it only work in the cellphone or I am doing something wrong? Any advise would be appreciate. Thanks.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Peter, 10 Mar 2008 @ 9:56am

I think they plugged the hole?
They must have plugged the hole. I tried the links last night and though i didnt receive a picture i got more of a response then i am today.

Has anyone had these work and STILL sees them working today?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
willmax, 12 Mar 2008 @ 11:12am

if you are looking for multi-lingual tv, online tv social community, social tv network, internet tv stations, tv channels, free global internet tv, broadband channels, live webcast, customized tv programmes, After testing various TV software and visiting loads of sites. most of them offer a free trial or preview and then they make you pay to sign up, or are cluttered with ads. I think that is ridiculous... so ive done my research and have found a couple of really decent sites. The first one Id like to draw your attention to is (http://www.viewmy.tv) This site has almost 1300 channels from around the globe and counting. it is free to register and they dont ask for stupid details, just your username and email address. It actually streams live channels so you dont have to download any and they have a pretty easy way of finding the channel you want. You can search through genre, country, region or name of the channel. oh and there are no ads either. Check this one out. With over 1300 channels from hundreds of countries, loads of features like channel rating, user recommendations, live chat, profile pages and much much more.

Now there is viewmy.tv Vista Gadget Created by (http://www.viewmy.tv) , this TV gadget gives you access to free Internet TV channels from around the world ! With this gadget you can play online TV right on your PC! Viewmy.tv provides access to thousands of free streaming TV channels from over a hundred countries. Viewmy.tv members simply add their username and password to the gadget to access all their saved channels from their personalised profiles. (http://www.viewmy.tv) provides access to free internet television with social networking and community features. They have also XP application for windows XP users which you can get from here -->(http://www.viewmy.tv/help/pc_desktop_tv.aspx). For the MAC widget and facebook application downloads go here (http://www.viewmy.tv/live-web-tv-help.aspx)
[ link to this | view in thread ]
derrick1, 19 Mar 2008 @ 3:17am

I agree...
this is totally absurd! How can they try and do this when these streams are widely available to everyone! Yes, these streams are available, on the net via URLS. There are loads of sites that show these so why have MobiTv acted like they created this!!!!! Willmax is right, viewmy.tv is a good example of this...go and check it out
[ link to this | view in thread ]
hashim, 25 Jul 2011 @ 9:16am

Re: I agree...
free mobtv
[ link to this | view in thread ]