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Crime Music

Hacker Jailed For Stealing Ed Sheeran's Unreleased Music (bbc.co.uk) 28

Bruce66423 shares a report from the BBC: A hacker who stole two unreleased songs from Ed Sheeran and sold them on the dark web has been jailed for 18 months. Adrian Kwiatkowski traded the music by Sheeran and 12 songs by rapper Lil Uzi Vert in exchange for cryptocurrency. The 23-year-old, from Ipswich, managed to get hold of them after hacking the performers' digital accounts, the Crown Prosecution Service said. Kwiatkowski admitted 19 charges, including copyright infringement and possessing criminal property. He had made 131,000 pounds ($148,000) from the music, City of London Police said.

According to police, seven devices, including a hard drive that contained 1,263 unreleased songs by 89 artists, were seized. A document saved on the hard drive summarised the method he had used to obtain them along with a stash of Bitcoin which was seized. In August, Kwiatkowski pleaded guilty at Ipswich Magistrates Court to three charges of unauthorised access to computer material, 14 charges of selling copyrighted material, one charge of converting criminal property and two charges of possession of criminal property. Chief crown prosecutor Joanne Jakymec said Kwiatkowski had "complete disregard" for the musicians' creativity, hard work and lost earnings. "He selfishly stole their music to make money for himself by selling it on the dark web," she said. "We will be pursuing ill-gotten gains from these proceeds of crime."

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Hacker Jailed For Stealing Ed Sheeran's Unreleased Music

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  • Unreleased music just sitting on the web? It makes no sense.
  • Not surprised. This guy's [wikipedia.org] no stranger to legal trouble.
  • For a split second, when I scrolled up the page and saw the headline, I thought it said, "Hacker Jailed For Stealing Ed Sheeran's Underwear". Reminded me of the stopped clock illusion [bbc.com].

    • Does anybody post on Slashdot anymore? After I clicked, I was surprised the few number of comments.

      I was about to throw out an arbitrary 'Eff Ed Sheeran' comment, but I realized I wasn't reading Reddit. lol

      How are the rest of you old Slashdotters? Haven't checked in since we were setting up Novell Netware on NT... Or, is there a new, better Slashdot forum now?

  • ... that Ed Sheeran's music should remain securely unreleased for the foreseeable future.

    • should remain securely unreleased

      We can secure the existing music deep inside a mountain vault.

      As for unreleased, I propose just offing Ed Sheeran to nip it in the bud and ensure there won't even BE any unreleased music.

      And why stop there? We can implement a system like in Black Mirror where people vote for the next notable celebrity offender to go.

      We can even use a blockchain to make sure something something, or just to hype it up.

      It's sure been a notable year for notable cunts dying. But goddamn I h

    • All his music has already been released. All he has to do is write it.
  • and screw the world

  • "Hacker jailed" has a nice ring to it. More, please.

  • by fluffernutter ( 1411889 ) on Friday October 21, 2022 @09:01PM (#62987423)
    A large company has a leak of a million customers personal data and we never know who did it. But take Ed Sheerans music and you're FUCKED.
    • A large company has a leak of a million customers personal data and we never know who did it. But take Ed Sheerans music and you're FUCKED.

      And when my email address was leaked no fucks were given. When it costs me personally hundreds of thousands of dollars there would be a very different level of involvement with law-enforcement.

      Personal info you give a company isn't worth as much as you think.

  • What is this thing called ârapâ(TM)? I mean âcryptocurrencyâ(TM)?
  • by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Saturday October 22, 2022 @03:23AM (#62987731)

    Since he stole it, Ed no longer had it and couldn't release it.

    Right?

    Because we wouldn't mislabel something "stealing" if it isn't, would we?

    • by Duds ( 100634 )

      I saw Dua Lipa had her laptop stolen and there was an entire book on there she hadn't backed up.

      Stupid enough but it turns out she'd had a laptop stolen 2 years ago as well and still apparently couldn't be bothered.

  • I really think kinda letting lower income people slide a bit on released music. Really they generally set the trends. Very good word of mouth.
    IMHO

    But unreleased music that is definitely harming the artist.
    Never listened to this one,
    But fundamentally my opinion
    Of the music is irrelevant.
    You have to draw the line somewhere.

  • WTH is a "digital account"? Does every musician has such? Is it some ministry of music, that everyone knows, gives it as soon as you are deemed a musician?

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