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19 Charged in Alleged Software Piracy Plot

Posted by samzenpus on from the they-don't-look-like-pirates dept.

Brainsur writes " A federal grand jury has indicted 19 people on charges they used the Internet to pirate more than $6.5 million worth of copyrighted computer software, games and movies.The indictment outlines an alleged plot by defendants from nine states, Australia and Barbados to illegally distribute newly released titles, including movies like "The Incredibles" and "The Aviator," and games like "Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2005."

3 of 311 comments (clear)

  1. Warez Is Now An Extraditable Offence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Parent article misses the major problem here - the US DOJ is going to spend boatloads of cash extraditing two of the kids in this case, one from Australia and one from Barbados. Warez is justification for extradition? The DOJ even admits in its press release that profit was not an issue here. This makes it wide-scale file sharing, and a waste of John Q. Public's tax dollars. Good job FBI/DOJ/assorted alphabet organizations wasting funds and following orders from bribed politicians... oh sorry, those were "campaign contributions" from the movie and software industries...

    As a shareware developer, I could care less about kids cracking my software, but I'm getting damn sick of the charade going on as the BSA cries (to its own benefit only) about the evils of piracy.

  2. WTF? by snookums · · Score: 5, Interesting
    From TFA:
    Each defendant was charged with one count of conspiracy to commit copyright infringement, which carries a five-year maximum prison sentence. Fifteen also were charged with copyright infringement, which carries a three-year maximum.

    Anyone care to explain why conspiracy attracts a harsher sentence than the actual crime? I mean, leaving aside the whole moral quagmire surrounding the criminalization of copyright infringement, how can thinking and talking about doing something carry a harsher penalty than actually doing it. Does this type of duality apply in traditional crimes like assault, murder and larceny?


    --
    Be careful. People in masks cannot be trusted.
    1. Re:WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Back in 2000 I participated with one of the groups that was indicted the following year in "Operation Bandwidth". The rundown they gave us was that if we didn't plea out as a group under conspiracy, they would go after us as individuals with an actual copyright infringement charge instead of conspiracy(they stated they had all the evidence they would need from the computers confiscated from the raids they performed to put each one of us away). On a side note, this is currently still an active case and I have yet to be sentenced in this case due to the fact that the U.S. prosecutor wants us all to be present at the same time for each of our own sentences and there are still people waiting to goto trial.