Virgin downloaders hit by AllofMP3.com fault

Virgin Media has denied it has begun to block AllofMP3.com, the controversial music site currently under fire from the recording industry and US trade officials. Virgin subscribers contacted The Register fearing the Virgin brand's association with the recording industry, or desire to throttle bandwidth on its network, had …

[oliver Stieber]

piratebay

Virgin seem quite happy to block pirate bay though, it's a good thing that tor is easy to install!

[Will]

Oh really?

"Virgin said any users who're experiencing the fault should get in touch with their details, as it might help fix the problem quicker. Contact information is here. ®"

Filed under "copyright abusers.txt" I'm sure.

[Jon Brindley]

piratebay?

Since when is piratebay blocked on Virgin?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pirate Bay Works Fine?

Im on Virgin Media and pirate bay works fine! VM does not block any sites as far as im aware.

[Steven Hewittt]

Don't use Tor!

Tor should NOT be used for BitTorrent - try Relakks. It's abour a fiver a month but it's a VPN to a server in Sweden where you can then do your stuff privatley. Tor is not designed for BitTorrent or heavy downloading use and doing so is abusing the volunteers who provide the free bandwith you are hogging!

[Tone]

I can access http://allofmp3.com/ from virgin...

I can access http://allofmp3.com/ from virgin...

[Johan Bastiaansen]

Allofmp3 is being squeezed out of business

not by blocking the website, but by blocking payments.

Users can't refill their balance.

[Anonymous Coward]

Allofmp3 is dead anyway

as they are having huge problems with credit card processing. Last I checked (last week), the only way to top up was to buy gift vouchers - and even those you can only get from some dodgy ebay outfits for a mark-up. The site looks like its business as usual, but people have not been able to top up normally for a few months now as is evident from their message boards. Even a Moldovan credit card processing company has dropped support for them. Oh well, there are others for now :)

[Anonymous Coward]

Riiiiight! "Trust me! I'm a lawyer!"

"Virgin said any users who're experiencing the fault should get in touch with their details, as it might help fix the problem quicker"

And of course, everyone should trust a company which is in bed with the pigopolists - they would never even *think* of violating the Data Protection directives, and providing user details to the lawyers at the recording company...

[Tony Pottrell]

Hmm

Using Virgin BB at home:

ping www.allofmp3.com

Pinging allofmp3.com [87.242.93.250] with 32 bytes of data:

Request timed out.

Request timed out.

Request timed out.

Request timed out.

Ping statistics for 87.242.93.250:

Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 0, Lost = 4 (100% loss),

---------

And when I dial into work's network (ironically using the Telwest network):

ping www.allofmp3.com

Pinging allofmp3.com [87.242.93.250] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 87.242.93.250: bytes=32 time=142ms TTL=52

Reply from 87.242.93.250: bytes=32 time=159ms TTL=52

Reply from 87.242.93.250: bytes=32 time=148ms TTL=52

Reply from 87.242.93.250: bytes=32 time=143ms TTL=52

Ping statistics for 87.242.93.250:

Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),

Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:

Minimum = 142ms, Maximum = 159ms, Average = 148ms

[Paul Stimpson]

It doesn't look like VM

As much as I'd like to rag on at VM after their bandwidth throttling announcement it doesn't look like they are actually doing this. I confirm allofmp3 is unavailable but a traceroute falls down a black hole somewhere in the Masterhost network in Russia:

<snip>

5 gfd-bb-b-so-530-0.inet.ntl.com [213.105.174.157]

<snip>

16 p12-0.core01.sto01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.0.194]

17 linx-telecom.demarc.cogentco.com [149.6.168.6]

18 linxtelecom-gw.masterhost.ru [217.28.253.38]

19 87.242.93.248

20 * * * Request timed out.

21 * * * Request timed out.

<snip>

[Martin Chandler]

AllofMP3.com Workaround

I use Demon broadband (Thus plc) and have the same problem. Are there any other non-Virgin Media users which have the same problem?

Anyway, I think I have found a workaround. I have installed Google Web Accelerator and this seems to have fixed it for me.

Hope this helps.

[Anonymous Coward]

Now fixed

Just checked and it appears to be back.

[Steven Burn]

Not a VM customer and site borks ....

PlusNet customer here and allofmp3.com borks here too. Same hop as Paul.

**************************************

Tracing route to allofmp3.com [87.242.93.250]

over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 1 ms <1 ms <1 ms [snipped]

2 55 ms 54 ms 54 ms lo0-plusnet.pte-ag2.plus.net [195.166.128.72]

3 165 ms 225 ms 440 ms ge0-0-0-504.pte-gw2.plus.net [84.92.4.90]

4 574 ms 53 ms 53 ms ge1-0-0-23.ptn-gw1.plus.net [212.159.4.17]

5 54 ms 55 ms 55 ms gi1-1-22.ptn-gw5.plus.net [212.159.4.6]

6 54 ms 53 ms 53 ms 195.66.226.185

7 164 ms 55 ms 53 ms t1-1.mpd02.lon01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.2.26]

8 62 ms 62 ms 61 ms p3-2.mpd01.ams03.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.1.169]

9 61 ms 62 ms 61 ms t10-0-0.core01.ams03.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.0.237]

10 70 ms 70 ms 71 ms p2-3.core01.ham01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.2.122]

11 76 ms 75 ms 77 ms RESERVED.FOR.core01.cph01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.2.150]

12 85 ms 86 ms 85 ms p3-0.core01.sto01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.0.250]

13 187 ms 86 ms 92 ms linx-telecom.demarc.cogentco.com [149.6.80.130]

14 108 ms 108 ms 108 ms linxtelecom-gw.masterhost.ru [217.28.253.38]

15 109 ms 109 ms 109 ms 87.242.93.248

16 * * * Request timed out.

17 * * * Request timed out.

18 * * * Request timed out.

/ad nauseum/

[Adam Buckland]

Payment down

You can't now top up your balance at allofmp3.com. The only way to "alledgedly" do it is vial an alltunes pin, but trying to buy one leads to a screen populated solely with :

Processing for this site disabled.

Glad I, whoops, glad my friend only has a balance of $1.97

::a

[Jon Lawrence]

working fine.

I can access allofmp3 without problems via VM.

The top up problems are nothing to do with VM and affect users from all ISP

[oliver Stieber]

Piratebay

It's blocked for me, I'm using Virgin Media's ADSL service, I've also got a download speed of 200k on a upto 8 meg line

[Anonymous Coward]

Try www.mp3sparks.com

AllOfMP3 seem to have cunningly sidestepped the credit card payment issue by setting up another site (which is identical, save for a change of colour and logo) called mp3sparks.com. I (er, I mean, 'my friend') topped up their with no problems. Visa or Mastercard, none of this JCB card or Luncheon Vouchers nonsense!

[Anonymous Coward]

Retraction

I hope the Register is planning on posting a retraction.

If you call virgin they will help you get connected to allofmp3.com

If you use some of the proxy servers you can connect to it.

If you are on certain parts of the virgin network you can connect to it

If you do a Tracert then you can see that the error is outside of the virgin network.

Basically, the whole article is non-sense, VM are not blocking it, if anything, allofmp3.com are blocking VM.

I hope to see theregisters retraction pretty soon, as it appears the infomation they have is all hearsay, and very little infomation checking was done.

[Anonymous Coward]

Russian mafia

I can't believe that no-one else suspects organised crime. Those guys who DDOS gambling sites for a living - why not DDOS a local site for the same reasons?