Samantha Rose Hunt13 March 2009, 1:30 PM
Piracy has never been easier than it is right now, thanks to a new mobile phone app that lets you 'scan' movies for download at your local retailer.
A new Android app called Torrent Droid uses photographs of DVD barcodes taken on your mobile phone to search for films using torrent trackers, and then remotely connects to your home computer to get the download going.
At this point in time the application can only be utilized with the Pirate Bay, which is still in court with a verdict due in April. More than likely other BitTorrent servers will jump on the bandwagon and begin offering access to the application as well.
Above: a cartoon shown on the home page of The Pirate Bay, which is under legal attack.The purpose of the Torrent Droid application is to turn Google Android phones into portable barcode scanners that are capable of linking directly to a Bittorrent search engine for simple remote downloading.
Android phones have been used for this before. ShopSavvy is an Android app which allows you to scan any product and then search the web for it to get the best price, or find the nearest retailer.
(In my opinion this application is quite ridiculous. Is it truly getting that difficult to simply type in the movie you’re trying to illegally obtain? You’re already stealing... why not just be lazy as well rather than walking to the DVD store?)