Kim Dotcom In Final Bid To Halt Extradition (bbc.com) 100
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: Controversial internet entrepreneur Kim Dotcom has begun a final appeal to halt his extradition from New Zealand to the U.S. on copyright-related charges. The FBI claims Mr Dotcom's Megaupload site earned millions of dollars by facilitating illegal file-sharing. But his lawyers told New Zealand's Supreme Court on Monday it was never meant to encourage copyright breaches. Mr Dotcom, who denies the charges, could face a lengthy jail term in the U.S. if extradited and found guilty.
Mathias Ortmann, Bram van der Kolk and Finn Batatom -- all former Megaupload executives -- stand accused of the same charges, which include conspiracy to commit racketeering, copyright infringement, money laundering and wire fraud. The US Department of Justice has been trying to extradite the men since 2012, and in 2015 a New Zealand district court said it would permit the move. The defendants have since lodged unsuccessful appeals at the High Court and Court of Appeal, leading to a final push this week at the Supreme Court. "In 2005 I created a website that allowed people to upload files to the cloud. At the time only small files could be attached to emails. Megaupload allowed users to email a link to a file. That's it," Dotcom wrote on Twitter yesterday. "In 2019 the NZ Supreme Court decides if I should be extradited for this 'crime.'"
Mathias Ortmann, Bram van der Kolk and Finn Batatom -- all former Megaupload executives -- stand accused of the same charges, which include conspiracy to commit racketeering, copyright infringement, money laundering and wire fraud. The US Department of Justice has been trying to extradite the men since 2012, and in 2015 a New Zealand district court said it would permit the move. The defendants have since lodged unsuccessful appeals at the High Court and Court of Appeal, leading to a final push this week at the Supreme Court. "In 2005 I created a website that allowed people to upload files to the cloud. At the time only small files could be attached to emails. Megaupload allowed users to email a link to a file. That's it," Dotcom wrote on Twitter yesterday. "In 2019 the NZ Supreme Court decides if I should be extradited for this 'crime.'"
Re: There was no "crime" (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Maybe this time there wasn't. But if there's some sort of justice, Kimmie will finally be locked up and the key thrown away. He's done enough damage to last a lifetime.
Re: (Score:3)
Well, let's see, what did Kimmie do so far. Mind you, this is a small excerpt, I don't have time to run the whole list (it's not like it's hard to google...).
1) Ran a few warez-boxes, and when he got caught, ratted out everyone and their mom so he could make a deal.
2) Ran an "information exchange" (take a wild guess what information was traded there), got paid in stolen calling cards that he resold, did the same with the information he got in strict confidentiality and, again, as he got caught simply dumped
FBI doesn't like end-to-end encryption (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3)
Not the case with the original Megaupload site.
That's only how mega.co.nz worked, which didn't exist until after megaupload was taken down.
He used his "living allowances" from the seized assets to pay for it.
Re:FBI doesn't like end-to-end encryption (Score:5, Informative)
No, what is alleged here is that Mega was actually paying kickbacks to the biggest infringers, and they continued to pay it even in cases where they knew about infringement. There are a whole bunch of specific actions that they took in order to help, many of which are alleged to show knowledge and intent to contribute to copyright infringement.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Precisely. Putting aside for a moment the philosophical tenet that copyright law itself is immoral, the argument Mega & Co. are presenting to the Supreme Court resembles that of an accomplice claiming he had no idea what his angry co-defendant would do with the weapon he introduced to the crime scene.
Re: (Score:1)
Exactly. If I was King of the World, I'd allow that behavior. I'm not. He's not.
I really value Courts going by the Law instead of their feelings, because they used to do it the other way and it sucked really bad for the little guy.
Re:FBI doesn't like end-to-end encryption (Score:4, Interesting)
It's really much more like firearms manufacturers acting surprised when military-style weapons are used to shoot humans. It works for them, why not Mega?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Replying to undo bad mod, stupid slashdot.
Re: (Score:3)
No need to get all butt-hurt, I'm defending Mega, not attacking firearms. I am a gun owner. If firearms manufacturers make guns designed for killing humans and then sell them to anyone, and don't get held accountable, then there's no reasonable basis for holding Mega (or Kim) accountable for what people do with encryption. And before anyone suggests that there is a fundamental difference because encryption is not a munition, it totally is. We literally have categorized encryption algorithms as munitions.
Re: (Score:3)
If you actually owned firearms you would know that these "manufacturers" don't sell their weapons to just "anyone".
I own a Peruvian Mauser, a SS Pro-Carry II, and a couple of other, legally unregistered firearms. "Manufacturers" sell their weapons to distributors, who sell them to gun stores and dealers (or directly to those stores and dealers, or other FFL holders) who then sell them to "anyone" who can meet requirements. In most states, that's anyone over 18 with an ID and a pulse. What I said was effectively correct, and you should see a doctor about that knee.
Re: (Score:1)
Maybe Kim.com isn't paying top dollar to political-weasel slush funds?
Re: (Score:3)
There is no such thing as intent in copyright infringement cases. Mega simply rewarded those that brought in ad traffic but it ostensibly did not know what the content was on its system.
Mega also helped many dissidents publish documents both for allies and enemies of the US. That's what eventually irked the wrong people.
Re: (Score:3)
There is no such thing as intent in copyright infringement cases.
1) There are a whole bunch of charges, many of which include intent, including probably all the alleged financial crimes.
2) Less relevant to the story, but more relevant to specifically what you said: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
3) Intent can show motive, which is part of a criminal accusation, and can also be circumstantial evidence in various ways.
Re: (Score:1)
Yea my mom was repulsed by that. If i was any of those womens husband or father creepy joe would be bloody joe.
Re: (Score:2)
Didn't want to know and didn't care is closer to the truth.
That's like the defense of a weapons dealer that he didn't know the guns were used to start a rebellion, as if there's some way an apiarist club needs a few thousands assault rifles.
Re: (Score:3)
Mega came after the charges and the illegal raid on his home. The charges are over MegaUpload, which wasn't encrypted, it was just a basic file sharing site.
Worse than the FBI going after him, this is the copyright industry using law enforcement to protect their intellectual property rights.
If he wins the appeal (Score:1)
I hope the next move is to revoke his residency, due to lying on the application.
I don't care if he goes to USA, Hong Kong, or back to Germany, as long as he gets out of New Zealand.
Re: (Score:2)
I hope the next move is to revoke his residency, due to lying on the application.
That sounds like Peter Theil to me. Kim Dotcom's problem is that he neglected to donate money to the National Party.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think the Labour government is too concerned about his donation record with the National Party.
Re: (Score:2)
Could we get to vote on it? I vote Antarctica.
Re: (Score:2)
They'll mistake him for a sea cow [wikipedia.org] and give him what ever he wants, due to being the last of his species.
Re: (Score:2)
*tries to identify
*tries to pay out
Let's not be disingenuous about how successful these are. I'd be willing to concede that they make an effort to identify someone. Then a less automate-able effort to identify who should actually be collecting. Then the minimum amount of effort legally required to try and get them their money.
Here on /. we have articles about how well that works, and how artists aren't seeing the money from music streaming. Because services will rely on fragile, ephemeral crap like file met
Brin & Page own Youtube right? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Kim Dotcom's mistake was to reside in a country with such an extradition treaty with the US and commit a bunch of
If DotCom is guilty, then Google is 10X as guilty (Score:5, Interesting)
There is all kinds of copyrighted material on youtube. Some of it has been there for ten years, and has millions of views. Most of it has no ads.
Re: (Score:2)
I think Google has worked out deals with copyright holders to pay them a small royalty fee any time someone watches one of those copyrighted materials. At least, that's what I've heard regarding copyrighted music on YouTube.
I've seen dozens of complete movies on youtube which are obviously not official uploads.
Mega encrypts files being uploaded to them before Mega gets any chance to look at the contents. Being encrypted, Mega can't determine whether the content is copyrighted or not, so they can't possibly be working royalty payments back to the copyright holders the way Google does...
Sure, but they also can't be paying uploaders for anything but ad impressions.
There are gray areas, but Dotcom is guilty (Score:2, Troll)
There are gray areas here. An analogy I used with a non-tech friend of mine: if you're a taxi driver and once in a while you pick up someone who, it turns out, is getting a ride to do a drug deal, but you didn't know, you're not complicit. But if you're constantly giving rides to drug dealers who talk about their deals while riding with you and pay you handsomely to look the other way, then yes you are complicit. And of course there are situations in the middle where things aren't clear.
Dotcom and his frien
Re: (Score:2)
> I would like to see the evidence that copyright infringement is what Megaupload mainly got used for.
I agree that that evidence is important and should be produced in court, if it hasn't already, and if it doesn't exist then Dotcom should be exonerated. But it's common sense that the users whose fees made Dotcom rich weren't paying to download content created by random Megaupload users, nor were those Megaupload users somehow licensed to upload that valuable content.
> Knowing that people are uploadi
Re: (Score:3)
There are gray areas here. An analogy I used with a non-tech friend of mine: if you're a taxi driver and once in a while you pick up someone who, it turns out, is getting a ride to do a drug deal, but you didn't know, you're not complicit. But if you're constantly giving rides to drug dealers who talk about their deals while riding with you and pay you handsomely to look the other way, then yes you are complicit. And of course there are situations in the middle where things aren't clear.
Good analogy. There
Not a great precedent (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
At least in the case of Facebook, I'm 100% okay with this.
Re: (Score:2)
Very unlikely. It would have been the first thing Kimmie does without making a huge spectacle with himself at the center out of it.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm absolutely certain he would love that. He's an attention whore, so anything that puts him into the limelight is good with him.
Legal fees? (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
They wanted to, but he didn't fit through the door.
Re: (Score:2)
Not possible. Sharing a cell with Kimmie would violate the 8th.
Good product, bad advice and serious risks (Score:2)