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Leaks Prove MediaDefender's Deception
Who will defend the defenders? writes "Ars Technica has posted the first installment in their analysis of the leaked MediaDefender emails and found some very interesting things. Apparently, the New York Attorney General's office is working on a big anti-piracy sting and they were working on finding viable targets. It also discusses how some of the emails show MediaDefender trying to spy on their competitors, sanitize their own Wikipedia entry, deal with the hackers targeting their systems, and to quash the MiiVi story even while they were rebuilding it as Viide. Oh yes, they definitely read "techie, geek web sites where everybody already hates us" like Slashdot, too."
there are more leaks!
MediaDefender Phone Call and Gnutella Tracking Database Leaked
MediaDefender wasn't only screwing people. They were screwing their clients as well (the big labels). I read a few of their emails, and one particulary caught my attention. I think Universal asked MD to produce stats about illegal downloads after they started another wave of lawsuits to see if these lawsuits have any effect on downloading (they were hoping it goes down).
... so much for the MAFIAA's claims.
One MD scumbag then forwards this email to his lackeys and he adds: "If you want a good laugh" to the forwarded mail.
These scumbag know that what they are doing is worthless, it doesn't stop piracy, but they both piss off users and rip off their own clients.
They also received one confidential study from a think-tank in Washington DC, the nice presentation had some extremely disgusting stats: only about 17% of the piracy comes from illegal downloads, the vast majority comes from people borrowing CDs
In case someone wants to have a look, Here is a on-line mailbox with all the leaked emails
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
I do find it funny that people will be paranoid about GMail now... the only reason these MediaDefender-Defender guys got in is because they knew the password. Perhaps GMail is more insecure than other email providers; however, afaik they didn't hack into his account, they just found out his password from another site and used it to log into his email. Not exactly GMail's fault.
Legally, the "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine applies only when there's some sort of causative link between the illegal discovery of something and the investigation into it. E.g., if a police officer breaks into your house without cause and finds your coke-cutting equipment, you're probably safe. But if your house gets broken into by a(nother) criminal while you're away, and in the course of the ensuing investigation the police find your stash ... tough luck. That's pretty much how I see this situation. The fact that the information came out because some guy's GMail got hacked pales in significance compared to the content that was disclosed, and I don't see any reason to cover my eyes just because of the source, when the source was just due to chance (or, perhaps, some sort of karma/fate/God).
Morally, these scumbags gave up any claim to anything a long time ago. Morally, they all deserve to be soundly beaten and left for dead on some island somewhere so they can learn to play nice with each other or starve. Because that's sadly illegal, pointing and laughing at their misfortune is a close second.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
MediaDefender is a company that the RIAA and MPAA hire to pollute Bittorrent trackers with fake torrents, track torrent usage, and spew false data out to torrents.
A group called "MediaDefender-Defender" got someone's password and spilled thousands of emails from within MediaDefender. Apparently some idiot forwarded all his corporate mail to Gmail, and used an easy password.
"MiiVi" was an attempt by MediaDefender to create a fake file-sharing site to entrap people. About two people fell for it, then they were exposed by Torrentfreak.
You should care because this company lied about its involvement with an attempt to "entrap" (legally, it's not entrapment, but it's still pretty morally grey). You might also care because it's another attempt by the RIAA and MPAA to screw over file-sharers. Or maybe you don't care about it. There's no assurance that you'll find everything on Slashdot interesting.
The WSJ got a 'no comment' from the NY AG ( http://www.moneyweb.co.za/mw/view/mw/en/page94?oid=161203&sn=Detail ). The AG's case was definitely related to child porn; not piracy.
Wikipedia is clear that it is AGAINST policy to self-edit. Read the Code of Conduct.
Just because they don't have a very effective police force preventing rude, deceptive bullcrap does mpt mean it is acceptable behavior.
And YES, changing what OTHER people wrote about you without admitting who you are IS an indication of guilt. When I defend myself from something I do NOT do it anonymously.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
...he/she would be protected under the laws we have regarding whistleblowing. Wait, how? IANAL (ever), but according to Wikipedia, the legal protections for whistleblowers appear to extend only to employees. My admittedly limited understanding is that MediaDefender-Defender was not an employee or group of employees but someone who claims to have 'infiltrated' the Gmail account in question. I'm not at all sure how that qualifies for whistleblower protection.Even if we all want to cheer MD-D, it remains that what they did was very likely a violation of a number of user policy agreements (Gmail, their ISP, etc.) and possibly illegal. Let's not start adorning them with medals yet.
So you can laugh all you want to...