Translated from:
http://internet.watch.impress.co.jp/cda/news/2006/12/12/14209.html

I can't guarantee that everything is translated accurately, interpret
at your own risk/leisure.

--
"NetAgent has started investigations of 'information flow via Share'"

NetAgent announced on the 12th that they have begun "services
investigating information flow via Share" (abbreviated: Share Survey).
It's announced that in addition to being able to determine files
transferred through the file exchange software Share's network, they
are also able to obtain information on the scale of distribution, and
which node contains which files.

According to NetAgent, when it's discovered that information are being
transferred through Share, "it is necessary to determine the current
status of file uploads, until then it is uncertain, and only 'whether
file exists or not' can be determined".

In this Share Survey, the company's crawler have accessed just about
all of Share's nodes, and is able to grasp the big picture of Share
users.  Concretely, their IP address and port number, and names of
downloaded files have been collected.  Using the update timestamps of
from each node's cache files, they are also able to determine the
download progress of the nodes they are observing.

According to NetAgent's investigations in December, there are about
390,000 to 450,000 Winny nodes at any one day, and about 100,000 to
150,000 nodes for Share.  Since 2006, there has been several reports
of serious information leakage due to Share.

Moreover, around the same time that NetAgent has started the Share
Survey, they are running a New Years campaign: from 2006-12-28 to
2007-01-03, they will investigate if files containing company names of
customer-orientated enterprises exist on the network, for 950,000 yen
(tax not included).