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Court rules Kim Dotcom can be extradited to the US
Kim Dotcom, who has been in the news so often that it's hard to believe his company MegaUpload was shut down way back in 2012, is running out of lives. A New Zealand appeals court has ruled that he can be extradited to the US to face criminal copyright infringement charges. Dotcom's lawyer Ira Rothken tweeted that he's "disappointed" with the decision, and plans to make a final appeal to the New Zealand Supreme Court.
Kim Dotcom sues the New Zealand government for $6.8 billion
Kim Dotcom, the founder of file-sharing site MegaUpload, is suing the New Zealand government for $6.8 billion dollars. According to the legal documents provided by the BBC, the claim covers the destruction of his business, loss of reputation, lost business opportunities, legal costs and lost opportunities on the home he was renting.
Supreme Court denies Kim Dotcom petition to keep $40 million in assets
Kim Dotcom, the founder of illegal file-sharing site Megaupload, was arrested in 2012 by New Zealand authorities on behalf of the US. He still has not been extradited to the US, however. In April of this year, the file-sharing maven asked the US Supreme Court to overturn a 2014 ruling that let US authorities keep $75 million in assets seized during the original raid on his house. The petition was denied on October 2nd, which allows the seizure order to remain intact.
Kim Dotcom asks the Supreme Court to hear him out
Kim Dotcom, the founder of file-sharing website Megaupload, is taking his case to the United States Supreme Court. He's petitioned the highest court in the land to overturn a ruling allowing US authorities to keep $75 million in assets seized during a 2012 raid on Dotcom's house in Auckland, New Zealand.
Kim Dotcom will be allowed to stream his extradition appeal
The extradition case for Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom can be streamed on YouTube, a New Zealand court has ruled. The German internet entrepreneur -- now living in Auckland, the nation's largest city -- and three of his former colleagues began a six-week hearing earlier this week to appeal a December court decision that allows them to be extradited to the US to face conspiracy, racketeering and money-laundering charges.
Kim Dotcom hopes to livestream his extradition appeal
Megaupload creator Kim Dotcom is in the fight of his life as he appeals his possible extradition to the US, and he wants everyone to know it. He's requesting that the Auckland, New Zealand court hearing his case should let him livestream the hearing on YouTube. Dotcom and his lawyer Ira Rothken argue that this is the definition of a "public interest" case. Megaupload's abrupt shutdown over allegedly facilitating piracy, and the resulting criminal action, supposedly had a far-reaching effect on the internet.
Kim Dotcom could face extradition to the US
Kim Dotcom, essentially the Motion Picture Association of America and Digital Millennium Copyright Act's de facto prime target, and his colleagues actually can be extradited to the United States to face copyright charges according to a judicial ruling. However, don't expect the man behind Megaupload to appear stateside anytime soon.As The New Zealand Herald, Dotcom's local news publication, tells it, the internet mogul has 15 days to appeal or apply for a writ of habeas corpus (produce the body) and it looks like his legal defense team is already taking care of that. In addition to copyright infringement, he faces charges for racketeering and money laundering as well. The BBC reports that he owes domestic authorities somewhere in the neighborhood of $500 million.
Kim Dotcom promises to launch an open-source competitor to Mega (updated)
Third time's a charm. Kim Dotcom -- creator of Megaupload and Mega file-sharing sites, New Zealand politician, US fugitive -- plans to launch a third cloud-storage company when his existing non-compete clause runs out at the end of the year. Dotcom briefly outlined his plans for a new site in a Slashdot user interview, saying, "I will create a Mega competitor that is completely open source and non-profit, similar to the Wikipedia model. I want to give everyone free, unlimited and encrypted cloud storage with the help of donations from the community to keep things going."
FBI slip-up leaves Megaupload, other seized sites hosting nasty ads
The FBI might want to continue brushing up on its internet skills. The agency's online division forgot to renew the web domain it uses to host seized websites, leading to a "black hat SEO" marketer taking over sites like Megaupload and temporarily filling them with malware- and scam-laden ads. Law enforcement officials eventually got their former domain suspended due to an "ongoing criminal investigation" into the malware, but the address' ultimate fate remains up in the air. Suffice it to say that the mistake is ironic -- the FBI inadvertently contributed to the very sort of digital crime it's trying to stop.
Megaupload piracy case lands its first prison sentence
The US government leveled piracy charges against Megaupload's operators three years ago, but it looks like those efforts are only now leading to real convictions. Programmer Andrus Nõmm has ended his extradition fight and pleaded guilty to charges that he helped commit copyright infringement by knowingly developing for a site that thrived on sharing bootleg files. He'll spend a year in prison, which takes into account both his role at Megaupload and his willingness to confess.
Canada's digital spies are watching what you download
It's not just American and British spies who want to know what you're downloading. Documents leaked by Edward Snowden reveal that Canada's digital surveillance agency, the Communication Security Establishment, has been monitoring the file transfer activity of at least 102 sites, including Megaupload (while it was running), Rapidshare and Sendspace. The effort, codenamed Levitation, is meant to spot foreign terrorists using these file services to conduct their operations. It may only net a user's IP address in many cases, but the CSE can run its findings through databases from allied intelligence agencies (such as GCHQ and the NSA) to get names, email addresses and other personal details.
Kim Dotcom says he's broke
Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom might have been able to reclaim his New Zealand finances earlier this year, but his ensuing legal fight against internet piracy charges has apparently evaporated that. The entrepreneur told the BBC that he' has gone through $10 million in legal costs. His legal defense team stepped down two weeks ago causing Dotcom to initially claim he might have to represent himself at his bail hearing (which began earlier today). While Dotcom was able to reclaim some assets, dozens of bank accounts remain frozen. Dotcom's follow-up online storage service, Mega was valued at $164 million in March, although as the BBC reports, the founder doesn't hold a stake in the company. Financial troubles have also been compounded by his political party, the Internet Party, which failed to claim a single seat in New Zealand's general election two months ago.
Kim Dotcom parts ways with the music service that he helped create
If you're famous for being the most hated man in music, it might be hard to convince musicians that you're on their side. That's the problem facing Baboom, the music streaming service started by Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom. Now, however, the company has parted ways with its infamous creator in the hope of improving relationships with the musicians it needs to recruit. On the surface, the parting is amicable and, after selling his 45 percent ownership stake, Dotcom confessed that his presence was holding the site back, much in the same way that the Internet Party was tainted by association. There's no word on if his self-penned album will remain on Baboom when it fully launches in 2015, so best download it while you've got the chance.
Kim Dotcom offers whistleblowers $5 million to help Megaupload's case
The basic facts of how Megaupload was shut down in 2012 are public knowledge. But the founder of the file-sharing service, Kim Dotcom, believes there's a subtext to what really happened -- and he's looking for your help to prove it. In essence, he claims to be the victim of a "corrupt" plot between two back-scratching parties: the US authorities, which supposedly wanted to secure the re-election of President Barack Obama, and the movie moguls of Hollywood, who allegedly offered influence over votes in return for having Megaupload terminated for copyright abuse. The only problem? Dotcom will actually have to prove all of this to a New Zealand court, otherwise he'll face extradition to the US, not to mention a string of further civil lawsuits. And so far, it isn't going well.
Kim Dotcom will celebrate getting his fortune back on the race track
Kim Dotcom's getting his fortune back, and to celebrate, he's throwing a party. The Megaupload founder tweeted this morning that Auckland's High Court will return the cash, vehicles and property that were seized on behalf of the US back in 2012. On hearing the news, Dotcom tweeted that when he gets his stuff back, which should be within the fortnight, he will rent out New Zealand's Taupo race track and invite members of his political party, the Internet Party, over for a track day. We're not sure if it's open to current members only, but we doubt there's any harm in signing up, hell, you might just get a ride in his prized Rolls Royce for your trouble.
Big music labels file their own lawsuit against Megaupload over piracy
The seemingly inevitable has happened: following in the footsteps of the MPAA, the big music labels behind the RIAA have filed a copyright lawsuit against Megaupload. The companies assert that Kim Dotcom and crew both fostered and "handsomely profited from" illegally copied tunes shared through the service before the federal government shut it down. The RIAA is quick to add that Megaupload's death resulted in a drop in piracy across the board -- that's surely evidence that it was up to no good, right?
Editorial: Kim Dotcom, noisy rogue with a commonplace startup idea
Peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing has traditionally operated on a narrow ledge between perceptions of legality and illegality. The legitimacy of underlying file-transfer technology is never in dispute, though media companies might hate the unleashing of content that it represents. The narrow ledge is balanced between two activities: directly infringing copyright (what some users do), and indirectly facilitating infringement by providing a platform that makes it easy (what P2P platforms do). One purpose of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is to protect the technology of file sharing, and companies that use it, by inventing a theoretical "safe harbor" that shelters all sorts of user-powered platforms from the consequences of illegal actions by the users. If media companies hate digitization generally, they particularly loathe Kim Dotcom and his entrepreneurial file-transfer platforms. Their revulsion was fulfilled exactly a year ago when the US Justice Department shut down Megaupload.com, a network of shareable cloud lockers focused on music, movies and images. Like a recurring nightmare, and in apparent commemoration of the anniversary, Megaupload's bumptious founder is launching Mega, an evolved version of the same idea. Mega further narrows the P2P ledge and fleshes out its founder's complex ambition.
Kim Dotcom's Mega cloud storage launches for early adopters
Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom has been promising what's almost a sort of renaissance through his Mega cloud storage service. Now that it's open to the first wave of users, we have an inkling of what that strategy shift entails. Mega is currently just a simple-to-use parking place for data with a relatively large 50GB of storage in a free tier. However, it may grow quickly: there's promises of Google Docs-style editing, instant messaging and mobile access, among other plans. Eventual paid plans will offer considerably more storage of between 500GB for €10 per month ($13) to 4TB for €30 ($40), albeit with a bandwidth cap of twice the storage at any given level. As such, Mega is mostly a bundle of potential -- but it may stand out from the pack if ambition matches reality.
French Supreme Court orders Google to censor piracy related terms in Instant search and Autocomplete
The French Supreme Court has handed down a ruling that Google must censor terms such as "torrent," "RapidShare," and other phrases that could be related to illegal file sharing. The decision was in response to a case brought by SNEP, a French music industry group, requesting that Google be forced to censor its results and be held accountable for facilitating piracy. The court ruled that the Mountain View company couldn't be held responsible for people's decision to click through to sites containing illegal material. But it reversed a lower court decision, demanding that related terms be removed from its autocomplete database to making finding such content more difficult. Google was understandably disappointed by the ruling, especially since the company already actively blocks some piracy related search terms. But, that apparently wasn't enough for the SNEP. Check out the ruling itself at the more coverage link.
MPAA may let Megaupload users retrieve non-infringing files, does it for the Armed Forces
Megaupload's still immersed in hot water, but there are signs the legal temperature could be cooling... slightly. Don't breathe a sigh of relief just yet though, as a significant portion of that confiscated cache of cloud-stored files remains somewhat indefinitely under lock and key. A minor reprieve may be on the way, however, owing to a much more "sympathetic" MPAA which has asked the court to consider releasing non-illegally obtained content to previous users. And lest your evil eye be trained too heavily upon the Hollywood group behind the shutdown, the association's made it quite clear that, under the site's TOS, users were never guaranteed continued access to uploaded content anyway. The change of heart comes in response to a motion filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, on behalf of a member of the U.S. military, petitioning the return of personal, non-IP infringing files. According to the now-defunct site's founder Kim Dotcom, that group of "legitimate" users comprised nearly 16,000 accounts utilized primarily to share photos and video with far away family and friends. Of course, should this retrieval request be granted, a requisite procedure will need to be put in place to filter out copyrighted media -- a system that's sure to pose countless headaches for those involved. Nothing's yet been decided so, for now, the fate of your lost files rests firmly in the court's hands. Such are the perils of the cloud.