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MPAA Being Sued For Allegedly Hacking Torrentspy
goldaryn writes "Valence Media, the parent company of Torrentspy.com, one of the web's largest torrent search engines, has filed a lawsuit against the MPAA for allegedly hiring a hacker to steal e-mail correspondence and trade secrets. From the suit: 'The Motion Picture Association of America willfully and intentionally obtained without authority, conspired to obtain without authority, purchased, procured, used and disclosed private information that it knew was unlawfully obtained through unauthorized access to Plaintiffs' computer servers and private email accounts, in violation of United States and California privacy and computer security laws.'"
I pretend to know more than I really do by mooching off google and wikipedia.
Not only that but big chain renters like Blockbuster and retailers like Walmart will base their purchases on opening weekend success - doesn't do well the first weekend? Chances are good you'll never see it at Walmart and only after time at Blockbuster. Tie that in with the fact that Walmart (the largest single retailer of DVDs and CDs in the USA) only stocks the top movie titles (ie: no catalogue (old stuff) sales for studios or record/publishing companies), and you can see why profits are down and why they need to take these measures to tow the line.
The The Hollywood Economist is an excellent read.
Please stop APK.. you're only hurting yourself.
> If you have a legal conviction it would make the civil suit seem solid.
> A civil suit on it's own seems weak.
You've got it backwards. A criminal conviction requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Winning a civil suit requires preponderance of evidence. OJ Simpson was found not guilty but nevertheless lost a subsequent wrongful death suit.
Besides, there's no money in filing a criminal complaint.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
That's called "block booking," and it's been illegal for over 50 years.
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
HINT: Take a look at the usernames. Do Roscoe P. Coltrane and Don Johnson ring any bells for you?
If that doesn't help, then it's probably a good thing that you're unfamiliar with those two shows.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
eff.org
www.qsopht.com ~q
GAH. It *ISN'T* stealing. It's lots of illegal things: unauthorized access of a computer system, wire fraud, et cetera. It *ISN'T* theft, because theft includes (by definition) the deprivation of the item for its owner.
It's equivalent in the non-digital world would be sneaking into a business office and photocopying all their internal documents. It could only be construed as theft if it was copied onto the hacker's computer, then deleted on torrentSpy's, and even then it would just be a combination of tresspassing and such and destruction of property.
By definition, information can't be 'stolen', because when you take information, you are duplicating it, not depriving the 'owner' of it.
didn't Senator Hatch try to push through some legislation a couple years ago that would make this perfectly legal for copyright holders? That's about the time he made the statement about if being OK if the RIAA/MPAA "blew up their computers"
Yes. And about a week later, Senator Hatch got caught running pirated software on his government website.
We didn't hear much from him about blowing up computers after that.