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Anti-Piracy Bureau of Sweden Planted Evidence
American Sweden writes "Concerning the bust
at the Swedish ISP Bahnhof on March 10, IDG Sweden is reporting that Bahnhof
has posted their findings of an internal inspection. It seems as if the Anti-Piracy
Buereau of Sweden and their infiltrator "Rouge" had a good deal of involvement in supporting the busted FTP server not only with hardware but with so called "warez" as well. The blog of Lars Backlund has a translated version of the interview conducted in the report of Bahnhof." P2PNet.net has a breakdown of the relevant details as well. From the article: "As it turns out, APB (or, rather, their hired informer) supplied the servers and uploaded copyrighted materials. So that's why they were so sure to find stuff, they put it there!"
>So that's why they were so sure to find stuff, they put it there!
Well, the fun part is that they actually did not find the stuff they were looking for (specified to the court), and IIRC, they didn't even find the servers they were looking for.
Belief is the currency of delusion.
Well, I don't disagree with you. But I feel that it would be appropriate to point out that APB is not a government organization. It's just some people that are paid by various companies, and thus APB hasn't got any more rights than anyone else here.
They're saying that the hired infiltrator had retrieved and shared the most part of all games and movies released during 2004. To gain more space for all copies, the infiltrator had even bought and sent hardware for a total of SEK 20,000 ($2,800). In the beginning of March, he was supposed to send hard drives totalling at 800 GB, however the raid came in between.
Even worse, this raid was part supported by STIM, an organization partially funded by the swedish government.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Meaning, maybe he was a kid busted for warez, and the police offered him a deal (no jail time in return for access to the server). So the end result may be that he was working for the police, but he wasn't in fact the police.
1) Police don't make deals. Procecutors do.
2) Swedish procecutor's do not. It's an american practice.
3) The guy wasn't working for law enforcement. He recived payment from the 'anti piracy bureau' which is not a law-enforcement or government agency, but rather the Swedish equivalent of the MPAA/RIAA.
If that's the case, then I don't think the argument of planting evidence is going to work.
Entrapment isn't legal even if the police do it. It certainly isn't legal when a private citizen does it.
This is illegal in Sweden, FYI.
it also means red in french. not everyone uses english when they pick their alias. i've seen a lot worse
So the question then becomes whether such a distribution is sufficient to have the movies in question declared to be in the public domain.... Thoughts?
Why the hell would it do that? Do you live in the pre-1978 era or something?
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
Actually APB (antipiratbyrån) is not an authority, just a lobby group. So the government was not in on this (although they happily provided the thugs/policemen to carry out the operation). Everyone including swedish mainstream media are making APB out to be crooks and dumbasses now. For once the media does something good!
Sam has one liberty, which he sacrifices for one security. Can you tell me what Sam has now?
And of course as you should know, in Sweden, entrapment is illegal.
a) A license (or broader: "authorization") to distribute freely, does not imply a change in its copyright status. See BSD, GPL or any other license.
b) By default distribution and reproduction are exclusive rights of the copyright holder. Even if you legally download it (signing no license at all), none of those rights have been given to you.
Perhaps you should read 5 of the GPL (it applies equally well to any other software without a license):
"You are not required to accept this License, since you have not signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or distribute the Program or its derivative works. These actions are prohibited by law if you do not accept this License."
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Our liability figures are low here in Scandinavia, so it probably wouldn't be worth the effort by itself. Right now, this is mostly a PR disaster. It does have some very interesting criminal prosecution possibilities though, all Bahnhof needs to do is to press charges. From there the public justice system would drag APB through court, and Bahnhof would have a walk-over in civil court afterwards. That is much more common here.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
For you guys who know swedish hereis an interview where the public radio calls Henrik Pontén (The APB lawyer in question previously) and ask him how they could do that. My favourite quote (Liberally translated to English): "We are currently very busy hunting pirates. I don't have time to check our webpage every day".
Maybe a clarification is in place:
Legal:
bevisprovokation="evidence provocation", which means to eg. purchase narcotics if someone is already actively selling it
Illegal:
brottsprovokation="crime provocation", i.e. police actions that lead someone to commit a crime, which wouldn't otherwise have been committed - e.g. asking someone "can you supply me with...?", obviously it's likely that an individual that is capable of dealing does it anyway but wouldn't commit that specific crime unless he/she was asked to do so
Looks like a 21st century version of Sergeant Norman Pilcher's campaign against rock star druggies.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
..the sig of the person you're correcting? "(...) I am a lawyer. (...)"
Copyrights must be defended. Failing to do so means you lose your copyright.
Copyright does not have to be defended. Patents and trademarks must be. If you are careless with your copyright *notices*, it may exempt violators from liability. However, most any software/movie etc is full of copyright notices. As long as it is clearly marked as copyrighted, nothing can undo it nor the liabilities.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Copyrights must be defended. Failing to do so means you lose your copyright.
No, you're thinking of trademarks.
By intentionally placing a copyrighted work into an area in which it can be used freely and not placing such use under the protections of a license, a very good argument can be made that the copyright owner is not practicing due diligence in the defense of their copyright and the copyright is then no longer valid.
Not anymore. There were indeed laws to the effect of "keeping your copyright requires attaching a copyright notice every time you distribute", and in fact IIRC this was one of AT&T's big problems in their anti-BSD lawsuit, but today (since the Berne Convention?) everything copyrightable you create is automatically copyrighted, and nothing other than an explicit license from the creator can waive those rights.
These are some of the members companies of the Swedish Anti-Piracy Bureau. My guess is that most anti-piracy groups are run by them.
Buena Vista Home Entertainment
CAPITOL FILM DISTRIBUTION
Columbia TriStar Films
Microsoft
PAN Vision
Paramount Home Entertainment
Sandrew Metronome
Scanbox Entertainment
Universal Pictures
Vivendi Universal Games
Warner Home Video
Universal Music
EMI Music
Sony Music Entertainment
Very true. As a Swede living in the UK for the moment I have a hard time convincing lightheaded idealists and ordinary people alike that Sweden is very far from the paradise on earth they all too often envision it to be.
Even the almighty Swedish labour unions nowadays admit that the true unemployment figure is around 20%, far from the 5% the official statistics would have it at. Very few of my highly qualified friends back home have been able to find any sort of job at all upon leaving university.
Crime statistics do not make for uplifting reading either, and ethnic tensions are on the rise (partly because of the astronomic unemployment figures among immigrant - there is a part of Malmö where 90% do not have a (legal) job). Looking at those who do work, the disposable income per capita compares unfavorably to almost any other western nation.
This is not because of the current macroeconomic plunge. In fact, Swedish export industries are currently doing well. Yet, unemployment and related problems are, if anything, on the rise.
These facts and figures are currently hotly debated in domestic media, though opinions on what to do about the mess obviously differ sharply. In my view the probable root cause is a combination of the worlds highest taxes, the worlds most powerful labour unions and the worlds probably most generous sick leave benefits.
So the correct way of getting a prostitute would be along the lines of...
...., but I guess we can do that...
Drive up to a woman dressed as a prostitute and start asking for directions.
If it is a prostitute, it's likely they'll try to convince you to buy sex. If it is a cop, they may try the same thing.
You reply along the lines of... "well, I just wanted to get to
If it is a prostitute, your mission was successful. If it was a cop, she can't arrest you because you've clearly state it wasn't your intent to pay for sex, and are doing it because she suggested it and if you just get directions, you can just move on and try again.
It can be argued that a duly authorized agent places your copyrighted works on a server menat for wide distribution is explicitly waiving your rights.
Just a Tuna in the Sea of Life
Actually, by Swedish law you might find yourself persecuted if you provoce a crime.
But this is more like planting evidence, and I am pretty sure it is illegal in most western countries. It sure is here in Sweden.
War doesn't determine who is right, only who is left.
If the swedish court gets air of this, they can say bye-bye to their case. And after that they'll get sued... or even get charged with criminal offenses. Courts don't like people/organisations who plant evidence, most nations even have laws forbidding that kind of action.
They are. You're not comparing apples to apples here. For example, we Swedes have according to this reasoning become substantially richer during the past two-three years, as the dollar have lost about a third of its value against the krona.
Made us all a lot richer, didn't it? No, of course not. If anything it made us poorer because too much of our export is priced in dollars. Our standard of living as such hasn't changed because of this (yet, companies insure themselves against market fluctuations), while we're now ostensibly earning about what the average american does.
Truth of the matter is that the GDP per capita (average/median whatever) is a pretty poor indicator of wealth as it doesn't take the cost of living for the average family into account. Comparing with the time I worked in the US, yes, I made a lot more money, but it was almost all of it eaten up by a much higher cost of living. What little was left can be attributed to the difference between rich/poor here, i.e. I would be allowed to soar higher above the median/average, but also allowed to slide lower below it than here.
When you take many more factors into account then the picture is a lot different. Crime rate is one such. The "murder rate" (i.e. death due to violence, the courts don't factor into it) in the US is sky high compared to ours, some 8-9 times higher in fact. It's of course an interesting statistic in that it is fairly consistent from country to contry. And even within the same country over time. (Compared to say number of complaints filed, which is not.)
They would, if the cited work wasn't complete bunk to begin with.
Benchmarks don't lie. Liars (in this case a right wing so called "think tank") do benchmarks.
No, this is not correct. STIM is an organization dedicated to protect composers, mostly collecting royalties from radiostations etc. for broadcasting music. The American equivalent of this would be ASCAP.
The stars that shine and the stars that shrink
in the face of stagnation the water runs before your eyes
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