A group supporting the arrested developer of the popular file-sharing software Winny has raised over 10 million yen for his lawyers, it has been learned.
And a site set up Wednesday in support of the 33-year-old developer, Isamu Kaneko, has received over 1 million hits a day, it has been reported.
The account to receive donations for Kaneko’s lawyers was set up on May 13, and as of Friday evening the funds to support Kaneko, including money that was previously received, totaled 11,678,225 yen. Sources said an average of close to 10,000 yen per person was being donated.
The Web site supporting Kaneko is run by a group of software technicians separate from Kaneko’s lawyers. They have questioned Kaneko’s arrest as a technician.
“The situation of the activities that technicians usually carry out being deemed a crime all of a sudden and arrests being made is seriously shrinking software research and development,” a section of the site reads.
Kaneko was arrested over the development of Winny for supporting violations of copyright laws.
A new version of Winny has already appeared after Kaneko’s arrest, while security firm NetAgent has released a product to detect Winny from communications records. (Mainichi Shimbun, Japan, May 22, 2004)
