To be blunt, that’s a huge chunk of their userbase. And they run the risk of being legally pounded to dust once that image takes hold.
So how do they avoid that? Add a bunch of other stuff, for plausible deniability. And it seems to have worked, as the anti-piracy gods haven’t singled them out like they have past software projects.
To be clear, I’m not excusing Plex. But I can sympathize.
The security thing is ironic because my personal Jellyfin server (nor anything else on it) has been hacked, but Plex itself has had their database leaked recently. It’s actually the main reason I switched because I don’t like their auth servers being a giant common target. (Also, technically it theoretically means Plex employees can just let themselves in to people’s private servers)
Call it survivorship/selection bias if you want, but basically every hack I’ve been exposed to is from centralized servers getting exploited that serve millions of people. Plex, along with any other public facing service with lots of users, receives targeted attacks constantly. All my server receives is automated bots looking for 10-year-old Wordpress .php exploits (I don’t even run php on my server).
Playing devil’s advocate, I understand one point of pressure: Plex doesn’t want to be perceived as a “piracy app.”
See: Kodi. https://kodi.expert/kodi-news/mpaa-warns-increasing-kodi-abuse-poses-greater-video-piracy-risk/
To be blunt, that’s a huge chunk of their userbase. And they run the risk of being legally pounded to dust once that image takes hold.
So how do they avoid that? Add a bunch of other stuff, for plausible deniability. And it seems to have worked, as the anti-piracy gods haven’t singled them out like they have past software projects.
To be clear, I’m not excusing Plex. But I can sympathize.
Sure, apart from charging for remote access.
Remote access via their servers.
It’s really nice of them to fight the good fight while I use Jellyfin instead.
Which doesn’t have half the features and crap security compared to Plex/Emby.
The security thing is ironic because my personal Jellyfin server (nor anything else on it) has been hacked, but Plex itself has had their database leaked recently. It’s actually the main reason I switched because I don’t like their auth servers being a giant common target. (Also, technically it theoretically means Plex employees can just let themselves in to people’s private servers)
And I’ve never been attacked by a bear while wearing my goose feather headdress.
Call it survivorship/selection bias if you want, but basically every hack I’ve been exposed to is from centralized servers getting exploited that serve millions of people. Plex, along with any other public facing service with lots of users, receives targeted attacks constantly. All my server receives is automated bots looking for 10-year-old Wordpress .php exploits (I don’t even run php on my server).