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Aaron Swartz Indicted in Attempted Piracy of Four Million Documents

Posted by Unknown on from the but-information-wants-to-be-free dept.

An anonymous reader writes "New York Times has reported that Internet activist Aaron Swartz has been indicted for stealing more than 4 million documents from JSTOR." The indictment contains an exciting tale featuring trespassing, MAC address forgery, a Python script or two, and even computers hidden under a cardboard box. El Reg has a decent summary. Demand Progress has released an official response claiming the charges are trumped up nonsense.

2 of 174 comments (clear)

  1. Not Piracy by reebmmm · · Score: 4, Informative

    Perhaps this goes without saying, but the title is misleading. The Grand Jury did not indict Mr. Swartz on any copyright infringement or acts of piracy on the high seas. There are really only four indictments: wire fraud, computer fraud, unlawfully obtaining information form a protected computer, and recklessly damaging a protected computer.

    You can read the whole indictment here: http://ia700504.us.archive.org/29/items/gov.uscourts.mad.137971/gov.uscourts.mad.137971.2.0.pdf

    Criminal copyright infringement is not one of the charges.

  2. Re:He's a Reddit co-founder. by EvilStein · · Score: 5, Informative

    No, he is not.

    "Edit: Actually, apparently Alexis had this to say[Gizmodo]:
    He is absolutely not a founding member. We acquired his company in December, 6 months after Steve and I launched reddit."