Category Archives: Politics

MegaUpload Shut Down by the Feds, Founder Arrested

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MegaUpload, one of the largest file-sharing sites on the Internet, has been shut down by federal prosecutors in Virginia. The site’s founder Kim Dotcom and three others were arrested by the police in New Zealand at the request of US authorities. MegaVideo, the streaming site belonging to same company, and a total of 18 domains connected to the Mega company were seized and datacenters in three countries raided.

Just a few weeks ago, MegaUpload founder Kim Dotcom told us that his Mega venturesImage is Loading.... have nothing to worry about, as they operate within the rules of the law.

“Mega has nothing to fear. Our business is legitimate and protected by the DMCA and similar laws around the world. We work with the best lawyers and play by the rules.

“We take our legal obligations seriously. Mega’s war chest is full and we have strong supporters backing us,” Dotcom said.

But behind the scenes powerful forces were at work, plotting the forceful demise of MegaUpload, one of the world’s biggest websites.

An indictment unsealed today by the Department of Justice claims that MegaUpload has caused the entertainment industries more than $500 million in lost revenue and generated $175 million “in criminal proceeds.”

Two corporations – Megaupload Limited and Vestor Limited – were indicted by a grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia on January 5th, 2012, and charged with “engaging in a racketeering conspiracy, conspiring to commit copyright infringement, conspiring to commit money laundering and two substantive counts of criminal copyright infringement.”

Today, the authorities executed in excess of 20 search warrants in the United States and eight other countries.

Data centers in the Netherlands, Canada and Washington housing MegaUpload’s equipment were raided. In an apparent reference to the latter location, a source has just informed us that the FBI are currently detaining everyone at the ISP Cogent Communications’ headquarters in Washington DC, in connection with a Mega-related search warrant.

In addition to MegaUpload founder Kim Dotcom who was arrested today in New Zealand, another six alleged members of the Mega “conspiracy” were charged in the indictment:

- Finn Batato, 38, Mega’s chief marketing officer and a citizen and resident of Germany
- Julius Bencko, 35, Mega’s graphic designer from Slovakia
- Sven Echternach, 39,Mega’s German head of business development;
- Mathias Ortmann, 40, the German CTO, co-founder and director of Mega
- Andrus Nomm, 32, programmer and head of the development from Estonia
- Bram van der Kolk, 29, a Dutch citizen who oversaw programming and network issues.

Dotcom, Batato, Ortmann and van der Kolk were arrested today in Auckland, New Zealand, by authorities there. Bencko, Echternach and Nomm are still at large.

The authorities seized approximately $50 million in assets, which appears to include Kim Dotcom’s treasured collection of several dozen cars, as detailed below.

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A total of 18 Mega-related domains were also seized by authorities including Megastuff.co, Megaworld.com, Megaclicks.co, Megastuff.info, Megaclicks.org, Megaworld.mobi, Megastuff.org, Megaclick.us, Mageclick.com, HDmegaporn.com, Megavkdeo.com, Megaupload.com, Megaupload.org, Megarotic.com, Megaclick.com, Megavideo.com, Megavideoclips.com and Megaporn.com.

According to the Department of Justice, the individuals named in the indictment face a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison on the charge of conspiracy to commit racketeering, five years in prison on the charge of conspiracy to commit copyright infringement, 20 years in prison on the charge of conspiracy to commit money laundering and five years in prison on each of the substantive charges of criminal copyright infringement.

The legal action against Mega will set a precedent for similar cloud-hosting services. The MegaUpload site itself had no search function to discover content directly, but according to the indictment this was done to “conceal the scope of its infringement.” Would the same be true for services such as Dropbox?

 

 

Piracy Politics Fuel Internet Censorship

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Internet censorship is a hot topic in 2011, but also one that reveals the disturbing double-standards of politicians and governments around the world. This week U.S. Senator Dick Durbin sent China’s largest search engine a letter asking them to stop censoring their search results. A noble attempt, but at the same time U.S. politicians are encouraging Google to censor piracy related terms from their search results.

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Internet Censorship can be a confusing topic for politicians. In the U.S. most politicians have openly spoken out against rampant political censorship in countries like China, but at the same time on their home soil they are supporting censorship initiatives for economic motives.

As part of their ongoing effort to tackle online piracy, the House of Representatives organized a hearing last month titled “Promoting Investment and Protecting Commerce Online: Legitimate Sites v. Parasites, Part II.” The main topic on the agenda was Google and why the company doesn’t do more to ensure that infringing materials aren’t indexed.

Earlier this year we discovered that following pressure from the entertainment industry, Google had already taken steps towards censoring their search results for this very reason. The result was that legitimate products of legitimate U.S. based companies (e.g. uTorrent from BitTorrent Inc.) are now actively censored from some of Google’s services. Let’s call it economic censorship.

Google’s move was applauded by many politicians who subsequently cheered the search giant on to take it up a notch. During the House hearing last month the big question appeared to be why Google hasn’t ended piracy yet. Some clever search keyword filters could help there, some argued. Indeed, just look at the torrent site isoHunt which was ordered by a U.S. court to censor its search engine based on a list of keywords provided by the MPAA.

Yes, isoHunt’s filter also makes some legitimate content inaccessible, but that’s just considered collateral damage. The overall agreement was that censorship is needed to solve online piracy.

This idea is also nested in some of the more recent legislative proposals in the U.S. The COICA bill for example, that would grant US authorities the power to seize (thus censor) domains that are deemed by the authorities to facilitate copyright infringement. COICA was introduced by Sen. Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and supported by 18 other Senators including Sen. Dick Durbin.

Again, with COICA it seems that censorship is not really seen as a major roadblock for prominent politicians. To some, economic censorship appears to be a must in order to protect corporate interests. The human rights and constitutional issues that may be violated in the process are reduced to collateral damage.

Considering the above it’s very interesting to see that Senator Durbin, who supported the COICA anti-piracy bill, has this week voiced his concerns about Internet censorship taking place in China. Yesterday Durbin published a letter he wrote to the Chinese search giant Baidu. In his letter the Senator voices his concerns over Baidu’s censorship efforts and asked the company to take “immediate steps” to stop them.

“I recently returned from a Congressional delegation to China. I decided to personally verify the reports about Baidu’s censorship. During my trip, I accessed Baidu’s homepage and attempted to search for a number of terms. I was disappointed, but not surprised, to see that Baidu heavily censors its search results,” Durbin writes.

“As a member of the U.S. Congress, I am especially concerned about Baidu’s internet censorship because of your company’s extensive business dealings in the United States. Baidu has been listed on NASDAQ since 2005. I understand that two of Baidu’s five directors are American and that American institutions are significant investors in Baidu,” the senator adds.

So there we have it, censorship is a problem, but only if it suits the interests of the people advocating against it. This is often the case in politics of course. Many U.S. politicians don’t see any problems with Google censoring (possible) copyright infringement related terms, but if they or another search engine do the same with political terms then they change their tune.

Censorship is censorship, but many western politicians seem to make a clear distinction between political and economic Internet censorship. Hypocrisy?

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Russia Refuses to Recognize Pirate Party, Because of Its Name

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The recognition of the Pirate Party in a US state might have been considered the last obstacle to overcome before widespread acceptance of the movement as a viable political force. Yet there might be another country more obstinate than the US when it comes to registering political parties, and that’s Russia.

The Pirate Party, an international group of political parties looking at copyright, patent and trademark reform among other things, is well known to our readers. The name comes from the label given to them by the content industry, of which they seek to reform the meaning. There is also an older use though, which deals with crimes at sea. Confusing the two isn’t easy, or so you’d think.

The Russian Justice Ministry has turned down the Russian Pirate Party for registration because it says “piracy is an attack on sea of river craft, which is a criminal offense,” according to the Moscow Times. The Ministry also says that the name implies that members are all criminals serving prison sentences thus violating Federal law

While that accusation has been leveled before (by a UK member of the Commons, during the Digital Economy Bill debate), then it was only at Rick Falkvinge, then party chairman & also the founder of the Pirate Party movement back in 2006.

Understandably, the Pirate Party is upset, and has filed a protest at Zamoskvoretsky court in Moscow. ”Refusal to register a ‘Pirate Party of Russia’ offends 15,000 of the party members whom the Russian Ministry of Justice has called criminals. We are going to appeal the Justice Ministry’s decision in court,” says party chairman Paul Rassudov.

Lola Voronina, the Chief Administrative officer of PPI, and also a PP-Ru member told us: “The government doesn’t want any new parties to be registered – there isn’t much time left until the elections. So they are trying to find some reasons like this to decline registration.” When asked about the prospects of the challenge, Voronina told us: “We don’t know. But we definitely need to try!”

“The Russian Ministry of Justice made a curious mistake,” she continues. “The name, ‘Pirate Party of Russia’ reflects an ideology accepted worldwide. We are not a party of pirates attacking sea or river vessels for the appropriation of other people’s property. Could they regard two European deputies from Sweden’s Pirate Party and many other pirate parties across the globe as criminals?”

Of course, democracy in Russia is contentious. Back in October, former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev warned of problems in Russia’s democracy, accusing Prime Minister Putin of attempts to stay in power. Meanwhile the Democracy Index has them at 107, almost in the “Authoritarian regime” grouping.

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US Senator Worries Domain Seizures May Stifle Free Speech

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Following on from news of the third phase of ‘piracy’ and counterfeit related domain seizures in 7 months, US Senator Ron Wyden has asked the director of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to clarify some of the most pressing questions. If the domain seizures are to continue, the Obama administration has to be more open about the need for them and the process involved, he argues.

Earlier this week we broke the news that US authorities had started a third round of domain seizures. This time, it turned out that the actions were aimed at sports streaming sites. In total, 10 domain names belonging to 6 websites were handed over to the authorities.

As with previous seizures, the actions of the authorities were met with disbelief by the sites’ owners and their millions of visitors. The owner of Rojadirecta, one of the affected sites, questioned the legitimacy of the seizure since his site has twice been declared legal in Spain. In addition, many further questions were raised.

Today, we learned a little bit more about the justifications for the “Super Bowl Crackdown” after we obtained the affidavit that ICE agent Daniel Brazier sent to the US District Court. However, the request for a seizure warrant is very generic and leaves many questions unanswered.

Luckily, we’re not the only ones who want to find out more about the lack of due process and the need for domain seizures that comply with the DMCA. US Senator Ron Wyden asks the same questions.

In a letter addressed to ICE director John Morton he voiced his concerns, stating that the seizures are “alarmingly unprecedented” and that they could “stifle constitutionally protected speech.” In addition, Senator Wyden asks the following.

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1. How does ICE and DoJ measure the effectiveness of Operation In our Sites and domain seizures more broadly — how does the government measure the benefits and costs of seizing domain names?

2. Of the nearly 100 domain names seized by the Obama Administration over the last 9 months, how many prosecutions were initiated, how many indictments obtained, and how were the operators of these domain names provided due process?

3. What is the process for selecting a domain name for seizure and, specifically, what criteria are used?

a. Does the Administration make any distinction between domain names that are operated overseas and those that are operated in the U.S.

b. Does the Administration consider whether a domain name operated overseas is in compliance with the domestic law from which the domain name is operated?

c. What standard does the Administration use to ensure that domains are not seized that also facilitate legitimate speech?

d. What standards does ICE use to ensure that it does not seize the domain names of websites the legal status of which could be subject to legitimate debate in a U.S. court of law; how does ICE ensure that seizures target on the true “bad actors?”

4. Does the Administration believe that hyperlinks to domain names that offer downloadable infringing content represent a distribution of infringing content, or do they represent speech?

5. Does the Administration believe that websites that facilitate discussion about where to find infringing content on the Internet represents speech or the distribution of infringed content? What if the discussion on these websites includes hyperlinks to websites that offer downloadable, infringing content?

6. What standard does DoJ expect foreign countries to use when determining whether to seize a domain name controlled in the U.S. for copyright infringement?

7. Did DoJ and ICE take into account the legality of Rojadirecta.org before it seized its domain name? If so, did DoJ and ICE consult with the Department of State or the United States Trade Representative before seizing this site in order to consider how doing so is consistent with U.S. foreign policy and commercial objectives

8. In an affidavit written by Special Agent Andrew Reynolds, he uses his ability to download four specific songs on the domain name dajaz1.com as justification for seizure of this domain name. According to press accounts, the songs in question were legally provided to the operator of the domain name for the purpose of distribution. Please explain the Administration’s justification for continued seizure of this domain name and its rationale for not providing this domain name operator, and others, due process.

9. Can you please provide to me a list of all the domain names seized by the Obama Administration since January of 2009 and provide the basis for their seizure?

10. Do ICE and DoJ keep a record of who meets with federal law enforcement about particular domain names? If not, would you consider keeping such a record and making it publicly available, to ensure transparency in government and that Operation in our Sites is not used to create competitive advantages in the marketplace?

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The questions above cover most of the concerns that were raised among the public, and it will be very interesting to see how ICE’s director responds. Last time he responded to the domain seizures, Morton made quite a few mistakes, so we hope this time around the answers will be more substantial and honest.

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