Justice Department Announces International Piracy Sweep

[Potato]

‘Operation Fastlink’ Is The Largest Global Enforcement Action
Ever Undertaken Against Online Piracy

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Attorney General John Ashcroft announced today the most far-reaching and aggressive enforcement action ever undertaken against organizations involved in illegal intellectual property piracy over the Internet. Beginning yesterday morning, law enforcement from 10 countries and the United States conducted over 120 searches worldwide to dismantle some of the most well-known and prolific online piracy organizations.

“Intellectual property theft is a global problem that hurts economies around the world. To be effective, we must respond globally,” Attorney General Ashcroft said. “In the past 24 hours, working closely with our foreign law enforcement counterparts, we have moved aggressively to strike at the very core of the international online piracy world.”

Operation Fastlink is the culmination of four separate undercover investigations simultaneously being conducted by the FBI, coordinated by the FBI Cyber Division, and the U.S. Department of Justice, coordinated by the Computer Crimes and Intellectual Property Section (CCIPS) of the Criminal Division. As a result of Fastlink, over 120 total searches have been executed in the past 24 hours in 27 states and in 10 foreign countries. Foreign searches were conducted in Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, the Netherlands, Singapore, Sweden as well as Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Operation Fastlink is the largest multi-national law enforcement effort ever directed at online piracy. Nearly 100 individuals worldwide have been identified by the investigation to date, many of whom are the leaders or high-level members of various international piracy organizations. As the investigations continue, additional targets will be identified and pursued.

http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2004/April/04_crm_263.htm


Similar zp thread: http://www.zeropaid.com/bbs/showthre...threadid=19767

[cjules13]

Wow, tha'ts pretty hard-core news. Sounds like it's mostly warez related, so it shouldn't affect the general user looking for movies and music...

[fireforce555]

And they were probably people selling it in mass quantity. Not just trading an item here and there on kazaa or something.

[Mr.Backstabber]

God Bless America, Home of the Brave, Land of the Free.

Next thing you know, you say "Filesharing" while talking on the phone and 50 FBI agents burst in and arrest you.

Its good to know that National Security still matters in this country. Mr. Ashcroft is clearly doing what's best for this nation, protecting us from ourselves. Forget about Bin Ladin, he doesn't matter, the real terrorists are are those who share files. Heck, Soon we'll all be listed as Enemy combatants and sent to Guantanamo Bay. Oh Well, at least that way I won't be sent to Iraq by the new "draft" I'm starting to here about. :mellow

[Krell]

EQUILIBRIUM




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[RACKnRAIL]

I feel that people reproducing software and selling it deserve what they get.

[ATLien]

Wow, that's pretty hard-core news. Sounds like it's mostly warez related, so it shouldn't affect the general user looking for movies and music...

It's more than warez. A couple of sites that I frequently, visit have shut down and posted messages saying that they were severed, and had 12 hours to shut down operations, for violating copyright violations.

[que-em]

Looks like Asscroft is about to strike down with the Wrath Of God us EVIL people.

Give these people a couple more years and you'll why the orignal settlers of this country left Europe.

[crackerjacker]

EQUILIBRIUM




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nuff said * yes i saw the movie*
peace

[smokingbevel]

Intellectual property theft is a global problem that hurts economies around the world.
...
Conservative projections of the losses to industry attributable to these distribution hubs are in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Wow, the Justice Department has single-handedly saved economies throughout the world. I had no idea that the Justice Department was so concerned with foreign economies.

The ongoing investigations were assisted by various intellectual property trade associations, including

Business Software Alliance (BSA)
Entertainment Software Association (ESA)
Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA)
Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)

No doubt members of these associations have received some of their "justice". Personally, I think "justice" is overpriced. Evidently, it may be the duty of the taxpayer to partially contribute financially to saving foreign economies, while investing in and discounting "justice" for special trade associations.

It should be noted that the Justice Department is successfully attempting to target certain file distribution systems, and thus, by their actions are reducing the number of files available on filesharing networks. If you can't locate that latest release on your favorite network, and are a U.S citizen that pays taxes, be sure to thank yourself and the United States government for spending your money wisely. If you're not actively engaged in the use of filesharing technologies, or just don't care about the availability of content on the networks, then this topic is probably somewhat irrelevant.

[wonderboy2005]

There is a very simillar thread here.

I don't feel like writing another post to respond to the same thing, but i would like to say that it wasn't just people selling the works. For instance, the release group Fairlight apparently went down in the raid.

[Jelsoft]

Shouldn't the FBI be chasing terrorists?

According to the reports, no reports has been announced, this could mean no warez member has been caught.

The members can easily start up a server again.