February 21, 2012
You may have heard about the debacle over media sharing site Megaupload just a few weeks ago. The U.S. government (at the urging of the Motion Picture Association of America, or MPAA, as well as other groups) had long been gunning for the massively popular website, which encouraged members to engage in piracy by illegally sharing protected media. But they just couldn’t seem to find a way to go after the foreign-run service (which was based in Hong Kong but operated remotely from New Zealand, where several executives made their home). Then, just one day after widespread online blackouts to protest anti-piracy bills SOPA and PIPA, the Department of Justice, in concert with New Zealand authorities, arrested several execs and shut down the site, thanks to new evidence showing that they were hosting some of their content on servers in Virginia. But the case, which was already looking bad for founder Kim Dotcom (nee Kim Schmitz, aka Kimble and Kim Tim Jim Vestor – he should be jailed just for his aliases) and his partners, looks to get even worse as new charges have been added to the already extensive list of alleged crimes.
Upon his arrest back in January, Dotcom was charged with both copyright infringement and wire fraud due to the piracy he facilitated on an international scale. On Friday, the U.S. DoJ released previously unseen evidence and statistics related to the arrest, as well as revealing that several more counts of copyright and wire fraud abuse will be added to the list of charges, potentially resulting in up to 20 years of jail time for Dotcom and his partners. As of January 20th, the wealthy website owner was unable to obtain bail in order to secure his release, but District Court Judge N. R. Dawson is expected to deliver a ruling on the subject on February 22nd. However, considering that Dotcom is a notorious international playboy with assets numbering in the multi-millions (although at least a portion has been seized), bail will likely be pretty high (if it isn’t outright denied).
Of the new evidence to come to light, some is quite damning. For instance, despite the fact that the site was meant for uploading and sharing files, it seems that 90% of users were downloading rather than uploading files (engaging in acts of piracy by virtually stealing content). Of course, the real lynchpin of the case is that Dotcom and his cronies encouraged users to upload copyrighted content by offering monetary rewards. One user who went by the name “W” is said to have uploaded nearly 17,000 files that were then viewed or downloaded 34 million times. Included were big-budget Hollywood films like Ratatouille and Ocean’s Thirteen. For these services, W allegedly received $3,400 in “rewards”.
All in all, Dotcom stands accused of damages to copyright owners numbering at an estimated $500 million (which they supposedly would have made on the sale of their media had users not accessed it for free on Megaupload). Thus far, the FBI has seized approximately $50 million in assets, including bank accounts, properties, cars, jewelry, and more. It doesn’t take a criminal justice masters degree to see that Dotcom is in big trouble here. Although he remains adamant that he has done nothing wrong, the charges stacking up against him tell a different story, and it seems unlikely that he will be able to wiggle out of this rapidly tightening noose.
