HenchFile.com: Who comes up with these names anyway ?

by Editor on July 26, 2012

HenchFile.com are a brand new file locker who attract up-loaders with promises of high Pay Per Download rates and generous daily payments.

HenchFile.com may be new but as we know all too well at Stop File Lockers, these sites gain traction very quickly unless we nip them in the bud. Our plan for HenchFile.com is to do precisely that, to stop them before they gain a foothold in the piracy industry.

HenchFileFrontPage

HenchFile make the curious claim that Paypal have endorsed them. When questioned about how long they can keep operating using Paypal they replied “Indefinitely. We’ve already been in contact with PayPal’s legal team and they’re cooperating with us.”. We think this is curious as they have also stated clearly that pornography is allowed at HenchFile.com.

UPDATE: 26th July 2012 Shortly after posting we rechecked HenchFile.com and found that Paypal appears to have been shut down.

HenchFileNoPaypal

UPDATE: 27th July 2012 Andrew Storey, owner of HenchFile.com made a legal threat we thought we’d share.

From: Andrew Storey [email protected]>
Subject: Removal of post

Message Body:
Hi

As we have identified, HenchFile.com is not a typical “file locker”. We are responsible and act in accordance with the law and always respond to the legitimate concerns of copyright owners. In addition we do not only provider regular file storage but also backup storage for web hosting companies.

Please can I therefore request that the article is removed?

In addition it is worth noting that we host vast amounts of personal and business files for people globally who are now unable to pay for premium access due to the report you filed with PayPal which is stipulated in the article. We reward our legitimate users via this method to promote them using our service as an added benefit.
We actively check all payouts for users BEFORE they’re made to ensure they’re not hosting any copyrighted material or files that contravene our ToS.

My lawyers may be in touch with regards to damages relating to loss of business due to the aforementioned.

Ergo, I trust that we can come to an amicable agreement and I therefore expect a swift response.

Kind regards

UPDATE: 3rd August 2012 HenchFile face more difficulty.

“This is a courtesy an email to make you aware of the progress we are making with the essential maintenance being carried out.

Unfortunately our primarily file server has suffered catastrophic hard drive failures involving multiple drives. We are working to try and recover any and all data however this cannot be guaranteed. RAID is in place on this server but due to the amount of issues the data may not be recoverable.

We apologise for the inconvenience this may cause, we will endeavour to restore services as quickly as possible and provide a further update as we get it.

Many thanks for your continued patience.

Kind regards
HenchFile”

Read on for more about HenchFile.com

Like most File Lockers we have featured at Stop File Lockers, HenchFile.com offer up-loaders generous rewards for uploading popular content. They recruit up-loaders on sites like Digital Point Forums.

HenchFileForumAffiliateOffer

On their own website they go into much more detail about what they offer in the way of rewards to up-loaders and affiliates.

HenchFileWebsiteAffiliateOffer

HenchFile.com make money by selling premium memberships which allow unrestricted downloading of content from their service. The business model is simple, receive more money in receipt of premium membership income than is paid out to run the service. Many file lockers seem to do this well, affiliates often complain that the file locker engages in shaving or artificially reducing affiliate payouts. It’s a bit like robbing Peter to pay Paul and just one of the curiosities of this industry.

HencFilePremiumMembership

As with most new file lockers, potential up-loaders of content have questions and one question that was posed was whether HenchFile allowed porn.

Henchfilepornallowed

Of course porn is allowed says HenchFile. It didn’t take too much effort to find some porn available for download from HenchFile, note that it’s copyright infringing porn also. Note that Paypal prohibits selling access to pornography as a part of it’s AUP and Terms of Service.

Henchfileporn

Then we found a PC game for download from HenchFile, pretty quick to attract the pirates we must say. This file host has been open less than two weeks!

Henchfilegamesdownload

The producers of this game describe themselves as “We’re a pack of six persons, who produce handmade, masterly crafted and laser containing games. Currently, we’ve just finished the first episode of Tiny & Big: Grandpa’s Leftovers.”. Small studios like this are hurt badly by piracy but HenchFile.com don’t care about that, they only care about selling premium memberships.

HenchFile is precisely the kind of file locker we wish to shut down, by reaching them early we minimise the harm to rights holders who have their hard work stolen by thieves.

Tagged as: file hosts, file locker, henchfile, liberty reserve, movies, payments, paypal, piracy, pornography, software

{ 31 comments… read them below or add one }

stupid July 27, 2012 at 12:41 am

thx for your work, paypal sucks so now we can work with other methode of payment, you still have much to do to stop the filehost and after that you must stop tracker, lool it’s impossible, you can just do it in your dream.
so at the end we conclude that with you or without you, with paypal or without paypal, we still work hard to make better the sharing, and piracy
we are legion. we do not forgive. we do not forget. expect us

Wayne Carr July 27, 2012 at 3:13 am

Dear stupid,

Nice go on the anonymous mantra but it’s not going to work.
What I can’t figure out is if people are so thick headed they don’t understand the whole concept behind file lockers and their incentives for people to upload or that you just play this way to create a front to continue their criminal behavior.
All anonymous (in this case a collective of uploaders composed of people like you) do is ddos, maybe hack away. In this case it’s not much of an issue as a website like this can be put up right away again. It’s not like Sony that stores vital information so attacking it is idle.
The reason people like you comment on this site is because it is having effect. Finally someone has come along with enough grit and tenacity to take criminals like you out.

Torrents are one thing (peer 2 peer) and file lockers are a whole other animal. When I do bit torrent there is no financial incentive for me to let someone download a file from my computer. In fact seeding (letting someone download from my computer) is something I don’t want happening with copyrighted content because I could get served a shotgun settlement case of $2-3k.
File lockers offer relatively safe harbors for downloaders and even uploaders. In turn for paying a premium charge for fast access (that mostly just covers bandwidth and hosting expenses for a one man show admin) this person gets to steal others work.
A downloader is paying you for taking the time to steal something that belongs to someone else. In turn the file lockers that grow the fastest tend to offer the best kickbacks to the uploaders.
Like drug trafficking, piracy is officially a viable businesses; the fact it’s done on such a massive scale doesn’t make it legal or any less severe.

If you have time to write here put it into more viable and fruitful pursuits. I write because piracy effected someone of my bottomline so it is worth my while.
Dealing with low margins is one things, free as a business model never amounts to a sustainable livelihood.

blink July 27, 2012 at 7:29 am

the games began, and we will see who will win

Dave August 30, 2012 at 1:02 am

if filesharing effects you (or someone of your bottomline) than think about the following: change your selling strategies: share your own content for free, make ads on your site or ask for donations. all this works, but all this old-minded people like you will never understand. If your way doesn’t work, think about it. And if you are at this point, think about, if you can change it or if you can use it. I think, you can’t change the effects the internet has been born. So you have to live with it and you have to search for methods to live in it. I make myself a living with filesharing, but not in a manner you think. i share my own content through my own site (with ads) and one big filehoster, you blame here on your site. So you site effects my living, but will you fight for my right. I think, the answer is “NO”.

Rick O'Shea September 1, 2012 at 9:56 pm: Dave’s logic shows an oft mooted argument wrapped up in statements of the obvious (“the internet has been born”…no flies on you eh?) that all distills to “change everything but bring it down to my level of acceptance and comprehension”

Some of us want to make shit better (and make better shit). Why should we be shoehorned into your way of thinking and belief structure and smile while being fucked by those who rip us off (and pay others to rip us off) with complete impunity?

If you can’t see through the bullsh*t mantra trotted out by the filelocker owners and if you think it’s entirely reasonable that they get rich off the backs of others who actually create something of value, then you deserve to live in your donationware and advert lead utopia.

To me it just seems like Stockholm Syndrome

Reply

nane July 27, 2012 at 4:21 am

Well, judging by this website, you and your fellows comments on gfy and your futile day and night struggle to stop piracy, I can’t help but conclude that you people really have nothing else to do, do you? And you still wonder why you aren’t making any money? Guess what? Money doesn’t grow on trees guys, it really doesn’t!
You people are so stupid that you think the Indian kids on WJ who can hardly talk English are representatives of the file-sharing world? Well, guess what? Just as you and your idiot friends are laughing at those Indian kids, the real pirates are also laughing at you and your friends’ idiotic comments on gfy and this blog. In fact, just as you read every comment on WJ, we also read each and every comment you people make on gfy, heck you people can’t even reach an agreement among yourselves and are already fighting each other which is beyond amusing.
Though I’m quite amazed that there are actually people in gfy who haven’t yet lost all their brain cells because of constant orgasms from getting screwed in their back-doors and are trying to open the eyes of you impotent old men but well, it’s gonna be quite hard to knock some sense into the brain of uneducated people like you, except maybe through your back-doors.

P.S. I dare you to approve this comment.

Andrew Storey July 27, 2012 at 4:37 am

We’re saddened that you have not in the first instance consulted with us prior to making these unsubstantiated and potentially defamatory and libelous claims.
Hench Online Services Limited are responsible file hosting/sharing providers and we actively seek out those who use our service for means of spreading or engaging in any form of illegal activity, such as copyright infringement.
I would appreciate it if you could forward me the link to the adult video you have screenshotted above so that it can be removed, I would be most grateful.

We provide a comprehensive DMCA reporting tool specifically to combat the hosting of copyrighted material (http://www.henchfile.com/dmca_report.html) which is linked on every download page.

We do not reward users who have engaged in acts which are seen to contravene our terms and conditions.

(link deleted)

Editor July 27, 2012 at 5:25 am: Andrew, all we have posted are facts as they were researched. Truth is not defamatory so get off your high horse.

The fact is that it does not take much searching at all to find copyright infringement on your site. Secondly you have stated yourself that porn is allowed. I quote you in answering a question about porn being allowed by your service, you stated “Yes it is allowed in accordance with the law and our site terms.”. It is known throughout the adult industry that Paypal does not process for porn, this is a well known fact. So that might be your first problem.

It’s also indisputable that easy and quick searches in Google throw up infringing content hosted on your servers. If we can find it so can you. So rather than bleating on this blog about how unfair the whole thing is, why don’t you start actually removing infringing content ?

Are you naive enough to believe that most of the files you host are not infringing ? Forget about the piracy revolving door that is DMCA. It’s fine to remove a few files when you’re paying users to upload popular infringing content through a Pay Per Download program because there will be many more files to replace the ones taken down.

We don’t play the DMCA game here. We understand you are in the UK, hey guess what ? DMCA doesn’t apply. You might honour it in the observance but you’re not legally required to do so. So let’s drop the DMCA charade and get down to the nitty gritty.

HenchFile pays people on a Pay Per Download basis.

Will you place in your TOS that nobody can post links to a Warez or Piracy blog, forum or site ?

Will you delete earnings for every infringing file brought to your notice ?

Will you delete every infringing file brought to your notice within 12 hours ?

Will you actively police your content and your users for infringement ?

Will you open your back end systems to outside scrutiny ?

We’d be interest to hear your thoughts.

Reply

Andrew Storey July 27, 2012 at 5:32 am

Will you place in your TOS that nobody can post links to a Warez or Piracy blog, forum or site ?
This is already covered in ToS section 7.

Will you delete earnings for every infringing file brought to your notice ?
Yes

Will you delete every infringing file brought to your notice within 12 hours ?
We aim for ASAP but typically everything reported is removed in a few hours.

Will you actively police your content and your users for infringement ?
We do however it is impossible to catch every ToS violator due to the volume of uploads. We enlist the help of service users to report where possible.

Will you open your back end systems to outside scrutiny ?
No due to the Data Protection Act.

it is also worth noting that within our very visible DMCA policy link we _do not_ offer counter notice opportunity as we act in good faith of those with legitimate copyright grievances.

As a side note, PayPal’s AUP does not rule out sexually explicate material categorically, it states that “certain” material is not acceptable.

Editor July 27, 2012 at 5:36 am: If that’s your response then good luck with your efforts.

Reply

mm786 July 27, 2012 at 5:32 am

I think this site just promote new hosts, with some common news
nothing else
m sure they get paid from henchfile.com for this topic
Lol!

DMCA July 27, 2012 at 5:35 am

In fact your site stopfilelokers.com is making more illegal than the ones you accuse. You are not in position to judge, other institusions are. You can expect lawsuits – it is just a matter of time. You should cease your actions, it will only bring you fines instead of profits.
What’s next, fighting against cloud storages?

Andrew Storey July 27, 2012 at 5:36 am

Why did you remove the link (link deleted) showing that we’d removed the file you have highlighted in this screenshot?

Editor July 27, 2012 at 5:40 am

Let the comments section show that HenchFile have deleted one infringing file referred to in our investigation.

We do not allow links in comments or link backs.

Andrew Storey July 27, 2012 at 5:51 am: No problem.

Reply

ifile July 27, 2012 at 3:35 pm

Just another rubbish hosts. Come on! SFL, when will I be heard of Depositfile, RS, ul.to, Extabit?

halali July 27, 2012 at 6:39 pm: this will never ever happen…

Reply

ifile July 27, 2012 at 3:37 pm

Since when and who authorize you to judge wether a biz is legit or not? How do you get the idea that no incentive means no uploaders? If file host is a lucrative biz damage your industry, why dont start your own file host?

DJC July 27, 2012 at 9:28 pm

Your site is very interesting and i am reading it every day.

I have two questions.

Can i have some info about you? Who you are and how can you pressurise in order a filehost to be closed?

Sorry for my bad English, I am not an english speaker.

Editor July 28, 2012 at 1:43 pm

We are an Australian private company and we investigate and then report on commercial copyright infringement to payment processing companies. We do not shut down sites, we do not shut down payment processing, these functions are reserved for the companies who’s terms of service these sites are breaching.

A company like Paypal will not terminate a site until they have conducted their own investigations and found the site in breach of their AUP or TOS.

It’s also worth noting that Paypal do not provide us with any information at all, communication with Paypal is one way only. We submit reports to Paypal and other payment processors and they merely receive the report, then they investigate the matters themselves and what happens between the merchant and Paypal remains within the confines of that merchant relationship.

We manually check and recheck sites we have reported to discover when Paypal or other payment processing has been terminated then report the results back to this blog.

nane July 28, 2012 at 4:19 pm

And what is even more amazing is that Paypal has become such a lawless company that they actually review and accept reports by someone like you about content you don’t own the rights to; i.e. people who in this day and age are called “copyright trolls”.
You’re actually doing file-hosts a favor, though, by forcing them to stop using Paypal, a company who is just a payment processor but is poking its nose in everyone’s business except their own, just like their bosses, the American government.

P.S. Let’s see what you’d be able to do when all of this hosts eventually switch to Webmoney!

Editor July 28, 2012 at 4:42 pm: When a company enters into an agreement with a payment processor it is incumbent upon them to adhere to the terms of service and acceptable use policy of the payment processor. If they don’t then they risk being terminated by the processor. It’s all very simple really.

Furthermore don’t make the mistake of thinking Webmoney is a safe haven for illegal or pirate content as they also have relationships with credit card companies which also have rules which prevent processing for piracy or illegal content, so they will need to be just as vigilant as Paypal or the card companies themselves.

Reply

nane July 28, 2012 at 4:24 pm

Oh, and forgot to say, everyone and their mom already knows that you’re only doing this just because you’re butthurt from the fact that Paypal doesn’t process for you and your friends’ crappy p0rn, not because you care about your content… Oh wait, you don’t even produce anything! /FACEPALM

Editor July 28, 2012 at 4:43 pm

The theories you pirates come up with are almost as funny as the excuses and justification for copyright infringement that you try to throw around.

nane July 28, 2012 at 9:06 pm: Yeah, yeah, yeah, just FYI, as I mentioned earlier, we do read all of you and friends’ comments on gfy; go fool someone else!

no July 28, 2012 at 1:13 am

the best part is sometimes I read these posts and comments. You are doing an excellent job but overall you are stopping less than 1% of people downloading your stuff without buying it. I download stuff and never pay all the time. All the time. I have actually gotten in your pocket and the pocket of every porn producer etc

i get it all for free
not trying to be rude because you are doing a good job with this, but it has no affect on me personally being able to steal all your content.

I haven’t found one thing that I couldn’t find and download for free.. i mean if it is out there then basically it can be downloaded… for free….
thanks

Pirates are Twats July 31, 2012 at 6:46 pm: Wow! You really are a copyright douche, aren’t you?
Why not try to produce something YOURSELF then see twats like you stealing it!

Reply

jadams July 29, 2012 at 3:44 am

Actually the TOS regarding Paypal and porn is flexible

ifile August 1, 2012 at 4:43 pm

Where did you learn that piracy is stealing or thieve? How did you define steal when you were at school?

Rick O'Shea September 2, 2012 at 5:28 am

@ ifile. Spoken like a true banker.

Ok, let’s go back to school for a moment…..

You’re lazy and don’t do your homework. The big bad teacher comes along and says “Hand in your homework by 1700 or face exclusion”

You sneak into my bag, take my homework away for a few hours and copy it before sneaking it back into my bag. You hand the copied version in and pretend that you did something worthy but really you’re just a lazy thief

Then you take the copy of my work, duplicate it 1000 times and sell these to everyone in the school year, giving kick-backs to the photocopier guy in the process

That makes you worse than a thief.

Get Benter October 24, 2012 at 7:42 am: You examples are not exactly accurate. Theft is defined as “the felonious taking and removing of personal property with intent to deprive the rightful owner of it.” In your first example, if someone does “take your homework away for a few hours and copy it before sneaking it back into your bag,” then hands it in, you have not been denied to ability to still hand in your homework as you normally would have. You have not been damaged in any way in that scenario. All that happens is two people get their homework turned in. You may, indeed, resent that someone copied it but resentment does not make something illegal. Had the homework been due prior to them returning it to your bag, causing you to turn it in late and be penalized for lateness, that might be a different story. As it you presented it however, you have neither been denied nor damaged.

In your second example, if you were trying to sell copies of the work, then someone else comes along, takes a copy and sells it as well, you are being denied that income and have a grievance. Also, if you never intended to profit from the work when you created it and someone comes along and finds a way to monetize that work, the decent thing to do would be to offer you a slice of the profits. However, holding the photocopier guy accountable for the damages in any scenario, while not holding the guy who decided to sell your work accountable, is nonsense. If someone calls someone else to plan a robbery over the phone, is AT&T responsible for that robbery? After all, they are being paid for the phone service. What if the two people have different carriers? Are both AT&T and Verizon now responsible? What about Apple, Samsung or whomever made the phone? They got paid for those phones, after all. What if someone goes to Kinkos and makes copies of money, is Kinkos now guilty of counterfeiting but not the guy that went there with the money with intention to copy it? How about Canon, HP or whatever company makes the copier they use? Should they be punished simply because they created a technology that someone else decided to use for a crime? What about the paper mill that made the paper Kinkos printed it on? Of course not, that would be absurd.

What this comes own to is an industry that has failed at a game of Whack-A-Mole when it comes to holding the actual people doing the crime responsible so out of desperation they are targeting whomever they can actually lock their sights on, acting as judge and jury and ignoring due process. That would be like holding Chuck E Cheese or the company that prints the tickets kids get when they win a game responsible for your failure at Whack-A-Mole.

Reply

HenchFile.com: Who comes up with these names anyway ?

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