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Feds Overstate Software Piracy's Link To Terrorism
Lucas123 writes "Attorney General Michael Mukasey claims that terrorists sell pirated software as a way to finance their operations, without presenting a shred of evidence for his case. He's doing it to push through a controversial piece of intellectual property legislation that would increase IP penalties, increase police power, set up a new agency to investigate IP theft, and more. 'Criminal syndicates, and in some cases even terrorist groups, view IP crime as a lucrative business, and see it as a low-risk way to fund other activities,' Mukasey told a crowd at the Tech Museum of Innovation last week."
When has the government ever presented a shred of evidence for any of their radical claims and crusades?
... Suicide Bomber Edition.
Putting the "death" back in BSOD.
Misery loves company. Online misery loves unsuspecting random strangers.
I can't believe how shamelessly politicians are using the terrorist bogeyman, and how easily people fall for it. Well, yes I can. But really, what's next? I'd like to say it can't get any more ludicrous than this, but I bet it can.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
It's a good thing sites like thepiratebay.org are making the sale of physical copies of pirated media much less profitable. Get those Torrents running for Uncle Sam!
Normally I am very reserved when it comes to political commentary. However, this time I simply cannot help but note that the show has certainly reached a new low, and we should all be ashamed of ourselves.
It is absolutely despicable that we've become so fat and complacent, that we allow our government to pull these sorts of stunts. Looking at the proposed legislation, one should note that IP infringement might be punished more severely than rape, if these laws are to become real. Actually, we should see the whole thing as a rape... the rape of our Constitution, and every value that made our society ever so slightly better than the regimes we like to fight so much.
Behold! When I noticed a response to this I secretly told myself "well it's probably a duh response", knowing just how well known the Fed's scare tactics come with "dem damn turrists". haha! I was correct!
My copy of Windows XP doesn't just *crash*, it crashes into *buildings*.
It's possible I'd get off on self defense if I shot the bombing one ... so that one.
"Because Science" is one step from "Because old book". Try "Because of my experiment testing my falsifiable assertion".
I thought you were serious until the bit about the IRA in 1986. Windows 3.0 was introduced in 1990. I think Windows 1.0 existed in 1986 but who would go through the trouble to pirate that? It wasn't until Windows 95 that operating systems really had any currency as a commodity (thanks to a ludicrous advertising campaign that changed the computer industry forever); the idea of someone hawking Windows 1.0 alongside illegal VHS tapes is pretty bizarre, to say the least.
They overstate everything's link to terrorism.
Everything that's illegal and/or generally not approved of by the US government "supports the terrorists".
Smoke locally grown pot (as most pot in the US is): you're supporting the terrorists!
Download your music through a peer to peer network: you're supporting the terrorists!
Pirate your software: you're supporting the terrorists!
It's the red scare all over again, but with a different enemy, isn't it? "Don't forget to go spend all your money on things you don't need and can't afford. If you don't spend more than you make and support our corporate buddies, you clearly want the terrorists to win."
what's that now?
But I just got done learning that Open Source is terrorism. Now we are told that terrorists pirate commercial software? Why would they do that if they have free alternatives? Help! I don't know who to hate!!
Last I checked the government uses terrorism (search and seizure laws) to finance their law enforcement operations. Hell, the CIA slings drugs to finance their operations too. I'm so sick and tired of this terrorism crap. All of this legislation is trying to address the symptoms of the problem and nobody wants to get to the root of it.
I swear, if I see the word 'terrorism' again I'll scream. Perhaps it is because I am outwith the USA and not properly indoctirnated, but 'the home of the brave' seems to be afraid of shadows these days, at least at a government level. Do the USA citizens really go along with all this?
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
The way governments use the "threat" of terrorism is becoming quite a joke.
They're throwing the word "terrorism" around a bit too much here, but at least a BIG part of the movie bootlegging scene is rooted in Russian Organized crime. Telecine machines are really expensive and, believe it or not, bootlegging movies can be very profitable.
No, i'm not talking about grabbing the latest RLS off of Usenet, or racing it across FTPs. I'm talking about large scale DVD pressing facilities that are selling to the guy who is, in turn, selling to people on the street corner. Groups get to release high quality stuff, the Mob gets their source for a DVD. Its very simple.
Or did you all really think that guys were risking serious jail time and throwing down thousands on Telecine machines because it was "fun"?
Now, i don't know much about the warez scene, but I would imagine that its a very similar situation.
Organized crime != terrorism. But a lot of the really large scale operations are certainly not being run by a rogue group of 16 year olds.
NewslilySocial News. No lolcats allowed.
I would like to thank the millions of people who voted for Bush twice (in no more than two elections), and for Congressional Republicans for something like seven or more times, for making our country both safer and freer, and operated with more integrity, just like y'all said it would be.
But I can't, because that would be a lie.
--
make install -not war
If he only knows the price of pirated software in third world countries (generally just a few cents more than the price of blank media) he would think twice before making such alarming claims. I can't wait to see him in UN security council showing a burned Vista CD in his hand, and illustrations of trucks "burning" CDs in the desert. http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/02/20030205-1.html [whitehouse.gov]
They talk about preventing information sharing at the "Tech Museum of Innovation".
factor 966971: 966971
...wouldn't the better reply be to *legalize* copyright "piracy", to use basic economics to drive their profit margins to zero?
Don't forget, 55 saves lives AND stops terrorism.
(I don't really know how, but I'm sure it does somehow.)
I'll happily stop trying to use pirated Vista and go with Ubuntu....
I just want to know: Does this mean that they stopped funding terrorism with my pot money?
Wowie. The government has overstated nearly EVERYthing's 'link' to terrorism (think liquids on planes)
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
Meanwhile, Mukasey's partner in crime Mike McConnell (the head of all US intel powers) is out there lying to shut down any constraints on Bush's powers to spy on us.
Feel safer?
--
make install -not war
some piracy come form not having the right CALs and other hard to work out terms.
Also not have a attorney on hard to read each eula's can lead to piracy.
As experience shows, many terrorists also earn a living as taxi drivers, waiters, cooks, and accountants. I think we should put stiff penalties on people practicing those professions as well, just to be safe.
How the hell does that answer his question? Pretty big difference between "Holy fuck we're being bombed by the Japanese!" and "Terrorists abroad are selling pirated, copyrighted material. Better clamp down with draconian laws back home!"
No sig for you!!
Piracy statisics and claims have been commonly botched overstated or flat out wrong in the past.
They just forgot to find a way to somewhat also cram the "child pornography" keyword together with "terrorist" and "pirate".
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
If they REALLY want to go after internet sources of funding for terrorists they should start with the spam / phishing /identity theft gangs.
That's, what? Hundreds of billions a year in direct theft and extortion of people's and companies' hard-earned cash, plus more multibillions in anti-malware products, damage to data, equipment, and network infrastructure, costs to overbuild the net to handle the bogus traffic, lost revenue due to DDoSing, etc. Not to mention the ongoing construction and debugging of a technology that can be used for even more nefarious purposes - including espionage and sabotage.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
sorry - I'm just stunned that someone would do that.
Wow, the Bush Administration has picked some real winners for that ol' Attorney General position. I really hoped they would replace Gonzales with someone who has a little more integrity. Unfortunately for the nation, it seems they're more interested in lapdogs who will parrot the Administration's version of reality, no matter the cost.
Moving on to Mukasey specifically, this little fib isn't the only time he's tried to distort reality. Just a few days ago, he stated there had been "a call from someplace that was known to be a safe house in Afghanistan and we knew that it came to the United States. We didn't know precisely where it went."
The interesting thing about this comment is that it's impossible to know whether it's true. This supposed call was not referred to after 9/11, nor during the 9/11 Commission hearings, nor at any other time until last Thursday.
However, even if we give them the benefit of the doubt, his arguments that draw on this statement are lies. This is because he made this comment in support of increased surveillance, and also to support the despicable circumvention of the justice system with regard to telecom companies.
The lie is that "we knew about this call but we weren't able to do anything because only with this new, super-powered law can we do that". The surveillance laws at the time he says this call took place absolutely allowed the government to listen in on it. They didn't even need a warrant, as even under the older FISA law, warrants were not needed for calls that comes into the US from outside it.
He lied again when he voiced support for putting telecom companies above the law. Even though Mukasey was a federal judge, he claimed that the telco lawsuits would let the whole world know how our intelligence organizations operate.
Fellow Slashdotters, I hope you join me in saying: what the fuck?! We can't continue to let these clowns get away with shit like this. I admit I've been as lazy as most "concerned citizens" in the US seem to be lately, but seriously, I cannot allow my democracy to be flushed down the toilet by a bunch of arrogant fucks who think they can get away with whatever they want.
This post is to advise all citizens that the following terms are now synonymous with Terrorism:
Open Source
Free Software
Piracy
Science
Global Warming
Civil Rights
Crime
Theft
Freedom
(Study of) Words ending in -ology
Thinking about or using these terms without referencing their link to terrorism is considered a Thoughtcrime
This post is to advise all citizens that the following terms are now synonymous with being Patriotic:
Lawsuit
Intellectual Property
Patents
Commercial
Censorship
Thinking about or using these terms without referencing their link to the positive effect on our society is concidered a Thoughtcrime.
Thank you have a nice day.
Yeah, the current administration is guilty of that crap.
What about the last administration and it's wagging the dog wars in Somalia and Kosovo - where there was NO US interest at all let alone oil interests? When groups opposed to the administration suddenly found themselves audited by the IRS? Where hundreds of FBI files on political opponents turned up in the White House (can you say Nixon?)
The parent poster was right. The democrats will violate your rights just as quick as the Republicans. They will just feed you a story you can swallow, instead of one the Republicans can swallow.
And would this be the same IRA that used to do most of its fundraising in the US.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1563119.stm
I dont read
I don't get it. How will passing more laws change that criminals will resort to crime to make easy money? Aside from the fact the government didn't present evidence that it's occuring, *even if it is*, how will these new laws make any difference? It's kind of analogous to laws against gun ownership. Even if you pass a law against gun possession/buying/selling, criminals will still obtain the guns, and will still have a black market in guns. I mean, the terrorists are *gasp* making money off the opium trade in Afghanistan, and I wouldn't be surprised to find out they're making money off of gun running / arms sales. I'm not saying they are, but the point is, just because you criminalize something doesn't make it stop happening to any significant extent. Often it just makes the illegal conduct even *more* lucrative.
I've noticed a trend in modern politics that the answer to problems with people breaking the law is to pass more laws. Instead of, you know, trying to enforce the laws we already have. Of course, the new laws never seem to hit their nominal 'target' but instead hit other targets. In this case, isn't *selling* pirated copyrighted materials already a *criminal* offense? I was always understanding that individual, not-for-profit copying was a civil matter, while commercial piracy was a criminal matter. Is that not the case?
More great 'leadership' from our do-nothing government.
The current administration is no worse then the previous, or next.
We have reached the point of critical mass on the way to becoming a police state. It really wont matter who is in office, as the system has its own momentum.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
If they aren't presenting a shred of evidence (and in this case, they definitely need to), then they aren't overstating anything. They're downright creating (well, fabricating) a connection. Saying that they're overstating the problem
1. Acknowledges that the problem exists, which it may well not.
2. Furthers the lie, because now all people will begin to believe that there is a connection, and its just a question of how strong the connection is.
And thats the beauty of it (at least from the DOJs side). Despite there being absolutely no factual evidence for this at all, even skeptic sites will only attack the lack of evidence and not the claim itself. Thus, the lie DOES become fact.
So, the situation in the US would be much improved if someone had the balls to clearly state terrorism manipulates senators so they pass laws that only create the impression of security. Terrorists then create so many false positives that they can hide with impunity. What was it? 1 in 300 Americans is suspected of terrorist links?
:v)
As a bonus, fixing this would get the background reasoning for senate decisions investigated and put out in the open where it should be.
Vik
Bin Laden sent us that software that we totally pirated. We swear.
crowbar??
More strict IP laws in the US will keep terrorists that are in other countries from selling pirated software? I don't get it. Unless they are trying to say that US citizens are the ones buying most of this pirated software, it doesn't really even make sense.
You are looking at piracy from the wrong perspective. It is not what percentage of the street vendors selling CDs for $1 are supporting terrorism, it is what percentage of terrorist funding comes from selling CDs, DVDs, VHSs, etc? How many pirates are supporting terrorists is irrelevant, the only relevant issue is how much of terrorist funding can be disrupted by a piracy crackdown.
Iraq has WMD.
We're spying on you for your own good.
We've got al Qaida on the run.
The current administration may as well be telling us that pigs can fly. Their credibility can't go any lower.
The only response Mukasey deserves is a good ROTFL by Congress.
Have gnu, will travel.
If I were a terrorist, I'd just buy myself some senators and tell them to make everyone scared so that they push through legislation and, separately, spend themselves into a hole. It's working a lot better than bombing.
We cannot afford to wait another second. We have to hit these freedom hating terrorists in the pocket AT ALL COSTS. Our very existance is at stake!
Copyright is providing terrorists everywhere with the tools they need to destroy democracy. I call for an immediate end of all copyrights! We must cut the terrorist's profit centers off NOW!
Simply upping enforcement and penelties will HELP THE TERRORISTS by driving their small time competition into lesser crimes like armed robbery.
Its simply naive to think that it didn't in some way support Bin Ladins organization.
Of course, though the whole reason you got the response is you were replying to a post that only mention MJ -- and MJ has been specifically target as somehow funding terrorism -- with what was essentially a non sequitor about opium.
But since we're on the subject, there's two funny parts about this opium in Afghanistan thing:
1) While they were actively trying to stomp it out while in power, now that they're trying to fund an insurgency, the Taliban is absolutely A-Ok with growing and selling opium.
2) The Northern Alliance et. al., aka the warlords we pretend are the "good guys" in Afghanistan, funded their operations from opium sales both while the Taliban was in power, but especially now that the country is in chaos and they're the "good guys" so there's a lot less pressure to stop.
So actually, if you buy opium, you have at least a 50% chance of supporting our side in Afghanistan. Delicious irony.
The enemies of Democracy are
That's where terrorists get their money. And/or drugs depending on which terrorists we're talking about. Why in the hell would you sell pirated CDs for a profit of what a dollar per disc when you can just a) wait for a rich sympathizer to give you money or b) run protection for a drug trafficker for untold millions.
In other news Timothy McVeigh sold bumper stickers and so the Feds have launched a task force to crack down on bumper sticker trademark slogan piracy.
I hope that's not an LCD screen you use. Cringing the pixels on an LCD screen can't be good for it.
oh, wait a minute, they probably think that open source software is anti business so that ain't gonna fly. I guess they are better off just constantly telling lies and creating new laws to pen every one in except their large business buddies.
It seems every day is April Fools day in the US.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Now,I wouldn't mind if the government could be convinced that terrorists are responsible for spam. True or not, I'd love to see them distract themselves with trying to solve it.
You've got a good grip on the situation, so I have to fix one factual error:
They didn't even need a warrant, as even under the older FISA law, warrants were not needed for calls that comes into the US from outside it.
Yes they were. FISA explicitly spells out when a warrant is not required, and it is only when it is believed that no "U.S. Person" is a party to the call. A "U.S. person" basically means a U.S. citizen no matter where they are, or a non-citizen who is legally within the U.S. So that means any call with one end in the U.S. (where it isn't known the party in the u.s. is here illegally), or even a call that takes place entirely in a foreign country that includes a U.S. citizen, requires a warrant.
However that said, the argument that they needed a new law is BS because here is what they could have done perfectly legally: Tap the call in question immediately, and then any time within the next three days showed up before the FISA court to ask for a retro-active warrant. And as FISA's record clearly shows, if they had any reason at all to believe the call was suspect, FISA would have granted the warrant.
In other words, and this is important because it applies to all the recent surveilance too: The only reason not to get a warrant is if they had no reason at all to believe that the call is of any interest, not one tiny scrap of hearsay to suggest that it's a terrorist call. It means that as far as they knew, it was no different than the billions of other calls made daily.
So remember, whenever they say they need a new law to let them listen in on certain phone calls, that law would ONLY allow them the new power to listen to calls that are, as far as they could possibly tell, COMPLETELY INNOCENT.
The enemies of Democracy are
Now, Piracy+Terrorist+Illegal Hyperlinks = ?
Illegal Hyperlinks
Anonymous
I'm not smart enough to connect the dots, if there are any dots to connect, but I figured I'd post these links and let you connect the dots or at least discuss the dots.
This looks to me, to be a move by the current head of the fbi to either attack the internet, or control it.
First we saw wikileaks get shut down by the courts, something completely unheard of, but it happened.
Then we see the story of the illegal hyperlinks and fbi stings.
Now we have the story of the fbi claiming that the terrorists are also software pirates.
I'm waiting for them to say the terrorists run linux and post on Slashdot. Also combine this with the battle over network neutrality.
Can someone piece together the big picture? Am I seeing a conspiracy where there is no conspiracy? Is this just about the fbi trying to increase it's power? Is this part of a strategy to attack the net? What exactly is going on?
Pirates and Terrorists and Hackers! Oh my!
I've been saying for a while now that it's only a matter of time before the term "criminal" was used interchangeably with "terrorist".
Historically, certain forms of government have successfully employed this trick - you just need a massively stupid population and that's certainly what we've got here. The difference, I guess, is that historically certain unnamed governments have invaded other countries on false pretenses and set out to rule the world...oh, wait...
Someone ought to tell this guy that no one actually pays for warez. ;o
Friend: "The NIC is misconfigured..." Me: "No prob, I'll just telnet in and fix it." *Silence*
today I had a non-fun experience with my landlord (I rent).
/.ers find that the place you are renting from is NOW, suddenly, starting to do 'inspections' ?
;(
for the last 2 yrs or so, they have been sending out letters saying there is an 'annual apartment inspection' and that I have to let the landlord in.
the thing is, I've read as much as I can about calif civil codes and there is NO provision for 'annual inspections'. hmmmmm.
so today when the maintenance guy came by (he was 'checking' every single apartment for god knows what) I told him NO!. I refuse.
I then asked what they were looking for and he blew me off saying that since I won't let him in, I won't get to know! sheesh!
a few yrs ago there was an 'idea' by asscroft (may extreme shit be upon him) to create something called TIPS:
http://www.havenworks.com/gov/operation-tips/
and today during a web search, I came across this link:
http://www.antiwar.com/orig/brimmer1.html
which also pointed to this TIPS thing.
I'm curious, any other
clearly this is a sneak-n-peek but just not done directly by cops. they get our own citizens to rat on each other.
the TIPS thing was supposed to be cancelled in 2002 or so. you don't really believe it was cancelled do you? it just went more underground.
I mention this because the current administration is running a-foul of the law of the land and he's trying to write his own 'king' ticket. they know that by getting citizens to spy on each other, that will keep the climate of fear alive.
anyway, hopefully hearing about TIPS and the 'annual apartment inspections' (that are quite illegal by my reading of section 1954 of the calif civil code. any lawyers here want to comment on that?) will get you clued in and aware of what is really going on in our country.
if the apartment manager wants to 'see your place' they should have an URGENT and real reason and not just to 'check for code violations'.
the story they used on me was they wanted to 'check outlets, the carpet, the balcony, general condition and plumbing around the apartment'. sure sounds like a FISHING EXPEDITION to me. what do you think?
I told them no and they wrote 'refused' on my form. how much you want to bet this ends up in some DC filing cabinet next to my name?
wonderful country we now have, here
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
You have this FBI Posts Fake Hyperlinks To Trap Downloaders of Illegal Porn
And this Feds lie about link between software piracy and terrorism
And this Wikileaks shut down
And this Anonymous
And this Net Neutrality Blasted by MPAA Bosses
And this (note, this may be conspiracy theory BS, but I'm posting it anyway) Pentagon: The internet needs to be dealt with as if it were an enemy "weapons system".
It's going to take someone writing an essay to try to connect all the dots as to what may or may not be going on behind the scenes, but it seems obvious that a lot of people don't like the internet, or perhaps the internet is just too free and a lot of people want to stop the internet revolution and cable TV the net. I'm sure it has something to do with net-neutrality.
They threaten the US and it's allies. No, I don't mean those quaint nation state things from WWII, I mean MSTF, GM, Coke, GE, Walmart, Disney, Warner Brothers, Exxon and so on.
I think you have to look why many principled conservatives are now supporting Obama: people like Andrew Bacevich, Lew Rockwell, and Douglas Kmiec. I really believe that only a neo-conservative administration - and except for Joe Lieberman and Zell Miller, all the neocons are Republican and the majority of Republicans are neo-con - would have gotten us into Iraq.
Douglas Kmiec's basis for supporting Obama is an interesting one, as well, because it seems he is one of the few people who actually has been listening to what Obama has been saying and watching what he has been doing. Obama is a Democrat who tells the underclass to stop relying on the state, being particularly critical of the culture of dependence that has harmed the African American poor over the past several decades. This doesn't make Obama a conservative. He's not. But then, who is? Certainly not McCain.
It seems almost any activity or medium can be linked to child porn or terrorism. I'm as skeptical about this as you, I'm not convinced.
I'm sure there are mafias out there doing these things, but enough to create new laws and agencies? I don't think so.
Here's the problem with enforcing existing laws: it requires a politician to do nothing, which means that he/she cannot profit from the current situation. Passing a law - any law - will allow them to claim "I'm doing something!", regardless of whether that something is actually useful.
Yeah, I don't like politicians.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
I don't see why a terrorist who hates this country and the people in it, would sell useful harmless products like software when the terrorist could sell crack or meth. Piracy, usually, is a victimless crime, so why would terrorists sell that when terrorists can sell poisons like drugs?
The only reason terrorists would sell pirated software that I can think of would be to install viruses on the computers of the people who purchase it, but why the hell would terrorists need to install viruses this way when the terrorists could just create a worm and upload it to the internet and let people install it themselves?
I just don't see the logic.
1) US laws only apply in the united states
2) AG is talking about terrorism in other countries.
3)Blatant Lies
4)????
5)Profite
actually "?????" can be replaced with, "freedom raping civil lawsuits that have more steep punishment than the statute of limitations of the same infraction charged as criminal"
Communism, its a party!
The only benefit of having more laws is that you have more criminals.
I always have to pay that Arab guy at the gas sta... OH... MY... GOD!! What have I done?!
Please stop stalking me, bro.
I thought the terrorists were making all of their money by pirating music, gold farming, and selling pot to their friends.
One of the biggest problems modern free societies face is an alleged free press that doesn't bother to check the facts about anything. If they had bothered to check the facts in this case, it should naturally lead them to the next logical question: What else is being claimed as fact with no evidence whatsoever? There's a whole lot of mis- and dis-information out there (not to mention outright lies and propaganda) and no good way for the general public to recognize it when it's spoon-fed to them. God knows the press/media isn't doing its job anymore.
No, the government really isn't afraid of terrorists, but making sure the citizens are allows them to expand their budgets, clamp down harder on John Q Citizen's movements and basic Constitutionally-recognised freedoms, ...
Too true.
If the government were REALLY afraid of terrorists the southern (and northern) borders would look like the old Berlin Wall.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Well people do sell boot-leg software cd's, and some of the people are going to be Muslims, some of the Muslims are going to donated the money, some of which will knowingly or unknowingly support Islamic terrorists it's a given. Now I seriously doubt that funds from selling bootleg software is a significant source of revenue.
A more serious matter is paid sperm donors! yes some paid sperm donors are similarly Muslims, some of the Muslims are going to donated the money, some of which will knowingly or unknowingly support Islamic terrorists so obviously we have to outlaw masturbation to protect civilization as we know it.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Studies by experts show that 100% of those running pirated software have a computer. This means that ownership of a computer may indicate involvement in software piracy, a terrorist act. Police should have new powers to arrest people who exit a computer store with a new computer. Meanwhile, real terrorists should continue firing rockets on neighboring communities while the world does nothing.
McCain/Palin '08. Now THAT's hope and change!
The Aum cult that gassed Tokyo with Sarin, shot the police chief and burned its enemies in microwave disintegration ovens did have a strong IT connection, but not to warez. IIRC they were involved in building and selling discount personal computers through a shop in Akihabara, this is apparently a good business model especially when you have drugged slave labor and management techniques that rival those in North Korea. Also Aum stored plans for death ray lasers etc. on CD or DVD which I think were found IIRC. And they also manipulated the media.
They never sold warez. And by the way there are books on sale nationwide in popular bookstores in Japan at least now that explain how to get dark warez or download movies (Hollywood movies from Chinese bittorrent - complete with a list of chinese characters you need to know, or porn that is illegal here).
There may be a market for illegal software but I have never come across it. Have heard about counterfeit Windows cds maybe in China. I suppose someone could make a bunch of cash by getting illegal software into otherwise legal distribution channels, but in these days of phone-home software I just don't see it as a growth business. I call FUD. FWIW I pay for my own MS Office or use OpenOffice. (OOo is great but it really screws up diagrams and if you try to pass edits of proposals between MS Word and OOo Writer you will wish you had just bought the darn thing. Which I finally did. Best idea is to get a friend at MS who will apply the discount for you.
I'd be willing to bet that Adobe Final Cut was purchased with US taxpayer money. The CIA don't even worry about open source or price when they're underwritten by the biggest bunch of suckers the world has ever known. http://whatreallyhappened.com/osama_dead.html
The Tea Party is just the GOP with a bag over its head.
And here I was thinking that by the looks of the professional quality of Osama's videos (at least the ones on CNN and FOX) they were likely produced by the same federal agencies that produced Osama himself.
Course I could be mistaken, but it makes more sense, since Osama, from what I'm told, has had kidney problems that require expensive treatment in Saudi or Dubai. Maybe while he's at the hospital, he's using their Windows Vista machines to splice video streams that predate 9/11, to come up with those strange videos that always show up at just the right time to push through a certain agenda in the USA.
Damn convenient all these "coincidences".
" What luck for rulers that men do not think" - Adolf Hitler
Why has nobody whacked Osama when he goes in for his "treatments" ?? I mean the constantly dwindling reward for his head (went from 50 mil after 9/11/2001 to something like 2 mil now) which is still considerable enough to keep any of us here on slashdot, and even most of the mercenaries out there, living it up for 10 to 20 years on that kind of cash.
:)
And yet nobody's whacked Osama? Very strange to me. Its as if the millions are not worth it, or as if Osama didn't exist... guy only seems to exist the way Emanuel Goldstein existed in Orwell's "1984"... as a figment of imagination of "the Party". The eternal badguy, who always resurfaces just long enough to scare the brainless cattle back into place, and back into line at the abattoir, since we all know the "inner party" likes them a nice medium rare steak.
" What luck for rulers that men do not think" - Adolf Hitler
some of the Muslims are going to donated the money, some of which will knowingly or unknowingly support Islamic terrorists it's a given
60+ years ago we would have put all Muslims in the USA in camps like we did with the Japanese for the reason that some money they earn might go to terrorist groups.
You just got troll'd!
not a cent to investigate the connection between Middle East oil monarchies and international terrorism funding. For why, read House of Bush, House of Saud.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Analogous to gun law, only when you don't understand the purpose of gun control.
Gun control (not gun bans, their different) are about stopping lower level criminals from getting guns, this is accomplished by limiting supply, requiring checks and delays on purchases and driving up prices on the black market (by making it more difficult for them to supply). Please use this analogy, Don Tony Mafioso is going to be armed either way he can afford any price for a gun, he's got the money and the contacts but he's not the target because Don Tony's not about to go and kill 13 bystanders for the fun of it as he doesn't want that kind of media and police attention being focused on his legitimate business interests. But Crackhead McGangMember will shoot John Q Random for no apparent reason and he is the target of gun control, Crackhead McGangmember doesn't have the resources of Don Tony, he cant afford $1.5K for a rifle, but he can afford $250 for a pistol or shotgun which he and his ilk will use in their little gang war killing any bystanders or cops that get in their way. Gun control is only as effective as its enforcement. Inconsistent laws (between states) and poor enforcement makes gun control ineffective not gun control itself. In places like Australia gun control has prevented innocent being hurt in gang wars, the only criminals with guns are the seriously organised ones like Biker gangs. Biker gangs will not shoot random people because they have their own business interests (drugs mostly) that they want to conduct clandestinely. The Asian and Lebanese gangs in Australia are forced to fight with knives and clubs, its a lot harder to hurt let alone kill another with a knife as well as giving the victim (a stab wound is smaller and cleaner than a bullet wound) and fighting change regardless of weather they are armed or not.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Unfortunately, in your insightful response (no sarcasm, that really was insightful and I wouldn't have caught it if you didn't say something), you stumbled upon the counter problem; if software were free, people with the ability would charge for the service instead of the software. If this theory doesn't hold up, open source will have a bit problem in the coming years. Ouch, I just realized how I've just managed to cut myself with a double edged sword.
If I mod you up, it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with what you've said, sorry.
Basically the organized criminals have discovered what the RIAA and MPAA never seem to work out, which is to say that people will pay for the ability to feel legitimate in their purchases.
Sure the legal justification is shaky at best(and in some places purchasing stolen goods can get you jail time), and the funds are going to people who are likely more morally repugnant than the record industry, but people pay it.
Kinda'. I dropped out of my warez scene, for many reasons, about 3 or 4 years ago. But, the when I left the scene, warez was really a pride thing between IRC channels and groups. It was all about having the most servers, the most efficient distribution network (and when I left, those guys had it down to a science!), the power to hold 'dump' access over someones head so that they'll serve for free while working up the ladder, and being the first group and channel to have a release within hours of a release.
I mean, in theory you could make money if you got dump access to a few TB of warez and started pressing cds and selling them, but the overhead in time and hardware (your bandwidth is maxed constantly, you're only downloading something new when it comes out and then you're sending it to people who have been idle for days on queue - and you gotta' have the space to keep everything that's hot) to keep a library of warez on cd/dvd marginalizes any profit you could make. You never run off more than 5 copies at a time, so you don't really get the benefit of the economy of scales. You'll want to keep everything organized, and stuff is coming in every day, that's a good chunk of your time.
At some point, you'll get infected or hacked - it will happen, it's just a matter of when, by whom, and how badly they want to make your life miserable. Worse than that, you might go and sell some discs with viruses on them; not something you want to deal with for a $5-$10 sale. The only way anyone could make money doing it is getting a specific hot software package (say, Windows) and spending the time to release it in mass quantities, passing it off as legit or selling in quantity to a middleman and making it up on sheer volume (greatly decreasing your ability to conceal your affairs). That also is exactly the behavior that will get you a nice sentence and fine if you're caught. The risk/reward ratios just don't line up with warez to a place where it makes sense, IMHO. When you don't have the risk, you'll never be in the black, and when you're in the black, the risk is more than its worth.
If I mod you up, it doesn't necessarily mean I agree with what you've said, sorry.
This is great! It means that F/OSS fights terrorism! If you can get software for free, there's no motivation to pay a pirate. Will the Bush administration now be throwing its weight behind F/OSS?
Support of Batista in Cuba, support of iran's dictator (too half assed to google, check the bastard that the US supported in iran before the current regimes), panama, the various CIA op in south America... The lsit goes even longer if you count incursion in Asia.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
If the Feds want to sling bullshit, make sure to answer it appropriately...
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
People PAY for pirated software? LOL. Glad I'm not funding terrorism, because I don't pay.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Is with a computer. If you look at the number of computers sold by the major OEMs, they don't add up to anything near 100%. The reason is that there is still a lot of computers sold by local shops. Well some of these places like to pad their incomes by selling illegal copies of software, particularly Windows and Office. You pay them $100 or whatever to include a copy, they never bother to pass that along to MS and actually buy one for you.
More common than you'd probably think, and users are unaware since most of them don't know what sort of things are supposed to come with a genuine Windows license (and MS has not helped themselves at all in that regard by changing shit all the time).
Slashdot Understates Ridiculousness of Terrorism Claim
"Reactionaries must be deprived of the right to voice their opinions; only the people have that right." - Mao
The answer is to reduce prices, rather than trying to keep them artificially high.
If copyright infringement is used as a source of funds by terrorist groups, and that's a big *IF*, setting higher punishments for the copyright infringement is actually going to help, not hinder them. Higher punishments may discourage some other parties, but terrorist groups, who are already engaging in far more illegal crimes (terrorism) which bring far greater punishments if caught, will simply not care about the comparatively light punishments for copyright infringement.
These people are willing to risk lifetime imprisonment, or even death for their crimes... Do you think they're gonna care about the risk of a 5 year prison sentence while raising money for their cause? Ofcourse they won't, they will spend their 5 years in jail, meeting new criminally minded people, and come out 5 years later with new knowledge and contacts in the criminal world, ready to continue fighting for their cause.
What the higher punishments will do tho, is discourage smaller copyright infringers who are not doing it for profit, or aren't using the profit to fund other more serious crime. These people are more likely to be scared out of the market, leaving more market share to any terrorists there might be.
However if you reduce the prices to such a level that it's no longer economically viable for the terrorists to sell copies, then they will lose this source of income and be forced to seek another. Copyright infringement is possible because the originals are so overpriced compared to the reproduction cost, and because the copies often remove undesirable anti-consumer measures (unskippable commercials, forced registration/activation, phone-home systems etc). Terrorists won't get rich selling warez copies of linux, just a thought.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
Terrorists (or criminals, mafia) use viruses or tojans to install software on people's PCs to get to their bank accounts or credit cards. They also install dialers to get money and many more illegal money milking methods.
Selling pirated software is much more difficult, dangerous and less profitable.
Atari rules... ermm... ruled.
... because nobody is going to buy from a terrorist if they can get the stuff for free from a file-sharer. It's the people who want to keep prices high that are the problem.
Reduce, reuse, cycle
If I'm not going to buy a DVD from a store because I can get it for free from the pirate bay, why would I buy a DVD from an obvious criminal?
Honestly, I've never figured out the whole "PIRACY FUNDS CRIME" angle since well, the whole premise of piracy is that I can get digital media for free!
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
It's amazing what passes for conservative these days. Bernie Goldberg said it best when he described the environment surrounding the leaders of CBS news some years ago. I'll paraphrase here... If everyone you know is of a liberal bent, with some of your peers being more liberal and some of them being less so, you can soon delude yourself into thinking you are a moderate. The same principle applies regardless of your social or political persuasion. If you only listen to Fox News you may find yourself thinking that all other news agencies are liberal. If you only listen to MSNBC, you make the mistake of classifying CNN as conservative. I know, I've heard myself say it. Bottom line for me is that I have for some time felt that a major portion of organized software piracy is a vehicle for revenue generation for organized crime. Regardless of the criminal intent of these organizations, be it terrorism or drugs, I'm happy that someone is taking a look at it. This problem didn't start in the last 8 years and damn sure won't go away if Obama or Clinton take the reins. That is to say that the problem is blind to political considerations and the solution must be as well.
Charter Member of The Committee Group For The Elimination And Eradication Of Repetitive Redundancy
'IP' (hate that term) piracy is just small beans compared to Identity Theft, and the government doesn't even seem to be considering passing legislation that would protect the victims from identity thieves and the resulting collection hassles.
Steve's Computer Service, Hobbs, NM
Soulless because they sell their soul in the first opportunity that comes their way. In this case, its RIAA and the robber companies that support them. check that out - the shit links software piracy to terrorism, and seeks out unquestioned power to detain people because of that.
there have been many bastards who sold their souls for a sack of cash during the course of history, but probably none of them were as stupid and as filled with filth as this one.
Read radical news here
Decades of experience shows that almost all terrorist organizations are supplied by donations from middle eastern countries, which has oil as their main product of export. NSA should arrest anyone driving a car, because they are indirectly supporting terrorism.
Read radical news here
...and Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey isn't the first to draw a connection. INTERPOL (The International Criminal Police Organization) has identified potential links between IP crime and the financing of terrorist activities:
A 2004 report by the Union des Fabricants also highlighted the links between counterfeiting and terrorism. One excerpt reads:
The assertion that "[c]riminal syndicates, and in some cases even terrorist groups, view IP crime as a lucrative business, and see it as a low-risk way to fund other activities" doesn't seem to be lie given the findings of others. It hardly seems necessary to make extensive references in a public speech given at the Tech Museum of Innovation when identifying supporting finding is easy to do. The speeches given by government officials are boring enough already without turning them into oral treatises to avoid being accused of telling lies.
Seeing how I certainly wouldn't want to fund such scum, and how it is impossible for a casual consumer to tell counterweight goods from genuine ones, I suppose this means that I'll have to download all of my IP stuff from BitTorrent from now on. Yes, I know, it might hurt the creators; but if you pay anyone, the money might find its way to the hands of terrorists, and we wouldn't want that, now would we ?
If you don't warez, the terrorists win ! Think of the children and keep those torrents seeding !
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
Does any one really think that the terrorists are more worried about IP law than they are with a Predator dropping a missle on their hut?