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FBI Responds to SOPA Protests with Shutdowns and Warrants
by staff report via lyn - CommonDreams Thursday, Jan 19 2012, 10:19pm international /
mass media /
other press
Warrants were issued in NEW ZEALAND!
Twenty four hours after Internet advocates held a GLOBAL online protest objecting to proposed anti-piracy legislation, which they claim is censorship at its worst and overreach at best, one of the world's largest file-sharing sites, MegaUpload.com, was shuttered by the FBI and arrest warrants served in New Zealand! [Draconian information control necessarily follows totalitarian Indefinite Detention law in the face of widespread, SUSTAINED, social paralysis/INACTION. As occurred in Nazi Germany, the best thing the civilised and educated German MASSES could do to stop Fascism's swift rise, was sit with their thumbs up their arses!]
The Associated Press reports:
An indictment accuses Megaupload.com of costing copyright holders more than $500 million in lost revenue from pirated films and other content. The indictment was unsealed one day after websites including Wikipedia and Craigslist shut down in protest of two congressional proposals intended to thwart online piracy.
The Justice Department said in a statement that Kim Dotcom, formerly known as Kim Schmitz, and three others were arrested Thursday in New Zealand at the request of U.S. officials. Two other defendants are at large.
Megaupload was unique not only because of its massive size and the volume of downloaded content, but also because it had high-profile support from celebrities, musicians and other content producers who are most often the victims of copyright infringement and piracy. Before the website was taken down, it contained endorsements from Kim Kardashian, Alicia Keys and Kanye West, among others.
According to the Justice Department, the indictment alleges that Megaupload is led by Kim Dotcom, aka Kim Schmitz, a German with a colorful history who was once convicted of a felony but he has repeatedly denied engaging in piracy.
DotCom and three others were arrested in Auckland, New Zealand by New Zealand police, "who executed provisional arrest warrants requested by the United States, Justice Department."
Along with Dotcom, Kim Tim Jim Vestor, 37, a resident of Hong Kong and New Zealand was also arrested. Authorities say that Dotcom founded Megaupload and is the director and sole shareholder of Vestor Limited, which has been used to hold his ownership interests in the Mega-affiliated sites.
"This action is among the largest criminal copyright cases ever brought by the United States," the Justice department said in a statement. The arrests "directly targets the misuse of a public content storage and distribution site to commit and facilitate intellectual property crime."
But, as the BBC reports, MegaUpload disputes how its services have been depicted and challenges media outlets who have discredited their model:
Before it was shut down the site posted a statement saying: "The fact is that the vast majority of Mega's internet traffic is legitimate, and we are here to stay. If the content industry would like to take advantage of our popularity, we are happy to enter into a dialogue. We have some good ideas. Please get in touch."
The official website for the US Federal Bureau of Investigation is the latest victim in a massive online attack against both the government and entertainment industry.
The Bureau’s official website, FBI.gov, went down Thursday evening after hacktivists participating in campaigns waged by the loose knit collective Anonymous attacked a series of sites in retaliation for a raid earlier in the day against the Megaupload service.
Following a federal raid that not only shut down the file sharing service Megaupload but also led to more than 20 warrants being served and at least seven arrests internationally, hacktivists took to the Web to respond. The result was an attack on the sites of several entertainment industry and government sites that crippled many of them. The websites for the US Department of Justice and Universal Music Group were among the first to go, with the sites for US Copyright Office, Warner Music, BMI, and RIAA following suit shortly after. At around 7:40 PM ET, FBI.gov finally went down.
Ongoing attacks have also been waged against WhiteHouse.gov, the official site for the Executive Branch of the United States.
“It was in retaliation for Megaupload,” Barrett Brown confirms to RT. A frequent collaborator with Anonymous, he is mastermind a separate campaign aimed at attacking Congressman that support the SOPA and PIPA legislations.
“We can expect a great deal of havoc of the sort we saw today. We’re going to see it in a stepped up fashion,” adds Brown.
Copyright applies.
Beware and be AWARE; Anonymous is a growing tsunami of opposition against criminal forces that have turned our democracies/governments against the people.
The Anonymous ARMY is overwhelming and increases in size and scope, DAILY; it is a direct consequence of the criminal actions of ruling elites and their puppet governments.
Be advised that every undemocratic, unpopular action forced onto the PEOPLE will earn the wrath of those that are capable of an EFFECTIVE, retaliatory RESPONSE. Fascists beware, your oppressive actions create massive opposite, un-equal, REACTIONS. Know that time/VICTORY favours the PEOPLE. Anonymous forms the vanguard of attack and offers effective RESISTANCE against the forces attempting to enslave the entire world.
File-sharing website Megaupload has been swept up in so much drama lately it is beginning to rival a soap opera.
The frequent developments in the online piracy case may be hard to keep up with. So, here's a roundup.
The Site
On Jan. 19, the U.S. Justice Department and FBI shuttered Megaupload and had the company’s founder and other executives arrested in New Zealand for "massive worldwide online piracy." Founder Kim Dotcom and three others appeared in court Friday and were denied bail.
The hacker group Anonymous retaliated for the arrests by claiming responsibility for taking down websites run by Universal Music, the Justice Department and the Recording Industry Association of America. At the same time, bad guys were trying to take advantage of the situation by creating fake Megaupload sites so they could phish people.
The Bust
Dotcom, also known as Kim Schmitz and Kim Tim Jim Investor, spent his 38th birthday on Saturday in a New Zealand jail. But he didn't go quietly.
Details of his arrest are now coming out. Apparently, it was a dramatic, high-tech stand-off when dozens of New Zealand police backed by helicopters swarmed Dotcom's barricaded mansion to arrest him on Friday. Dotcom refused them entry and police had to cut their way through electronic locks to a safe room, where they discovered him with a sawed-off shotgun.
"Despite our staff clearly identifying themselves, Mr Dotcom retreated into the house and activated a number of electronic-locking mechanisms," Detective Inspector Grant Wormald from the Organised and Financial Crime Agency New Zealand told Reuters.
With Dotcom in cuffs, officers then began seizing things -- two guns, computers, documents and vehicles, lots of them. Personalized number plates on 20 or so seized vehicles included KIMCOM, HACKER, STONED, GUILTY, MAFIA, GOD and POLICE.
The Media
You wouldn't think it a believable story, but it turns out there were weird nuggets underlying The New York Post's claim that musician and producer Swizz Beatz was CEO of Megaupload. However, the top lawyer for Megaupload now says that Beatz was never officially the company's chief executive, reports VentureBeat.
"To my knowledge, Swizz Beatz was never involved in any meaningful way," Megaupload attorney Ira Rothken said, adding, remarkably that "He was negotiating to become the CEO, but it was never official." Beatz' publicist had earlier said Beatz was the CEO. Beatz was also briefly listed as CEO on Megaupload.com.
Media companies say the legitimate uses of sites like Megaupload are a veil concealing extensive theft but that doesn’t stop big-time stars, including Beatz’ wife, R&B singer Alicia Keys, from promoting it. Check out this video, which the Universal Music Group had the video taken down from YouTube, despite having no claim to the content. It has since been reinstated.
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