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Megaupload User Data Could Be Destroyed Soon
New submitter advid.net writes "According to the Associated Press, user data from the recently-closed file-hosting site Megaupload could be destroyed as soon as Thursday. Apparently Megaupload paid another company to actually store the data. 'But Megaupload attorney Ira Rothken said Sunday that the government has frozen its money. A letter filed in the case Friday by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia said storage companies Carpathia Hosting Inc. and Cogent Communications Group Inc. may begin deleting data Thursday. ... The letter said the government copied some data from the servers but did not physically take them. It said that now that it has executed its search warrants, it has no right to access the data. The servers are controlled by Carpathia and Cogent and issues about the future of the data must be resolved with them, prosecutors said."
There's also been talk of a lawsuit against the FBI over users' lost files.
Archives for As if millions of MP3s cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced....
Absolutely nothing ... I don't think there was any question of "how" to do it. RTFA
Now if only my old embarrassing you tube vids would disappear the same way!
Doubt is a fickle ally!
Wouldn't that be destruction of evidence?
Captcha: retrieve
problem #1.. not hosted on DOS.
problem #2.. see problem #1
Hey! Let's sue the Gestappo!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
No, it's like the FBI impounding all the units in a storage facility because some of them hold illegal contraband.
how about legit files of your own creation that you had complete ownership of and decided to put on a cloud service?
not my porn, my precious porn!
does rule 34 apply here? Is there porn involving porn being deleted?
not quite. Its like the FBI seizing all units of a storage facility where the storage facility itself is believed to be storing illegal materials on the premises. The case about them isn't about users storing illegal materials, its about them knowingly allowing it, hindering the ability for the rights holders to remove it and building their entire business based on those illegal materials.
Did the users upload to MU and delete their local copy? If not, they still have their data.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
how about legit files of your own creation that you had complete ownership of and decided to put on a cloud service?
Still, I don't think you can sue the FBI for executing a warrant, unless they have gone beyond the scope of what was permitted in the warrant.
And as I understand, it isn't the FBI that is deleting the data, but rather a subcontractor whose bills have not been paid since Megaupload's assets have been frozen. I really don't see grounds for suing the FBI here.
If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
Exactly. Some people paid for this service and used it to store legitimate files. From what I've read, there's little question that MU employees and management knew their service was being used to trade a lot of infringing material, and even went so far as to play shell games with download links to avoid complying with the DMCA, but what of the people who used it legitimately, paid for the privilege, and are now going to have their files wiped? It's not like MU will have any assets to go after once this whole mess shakes out.
Check out my world simulator thingy.
And this is why you should never trust anything you can't afford to lose to the cloud. You lose control and have no idea what is really going on with your data under the hood.
"That's the sort of blinkered, philistine pig ignorance I've come to expect from you non-creative garbage."-Monty Python
Well, choosing them was a titanic mistake.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
If we are to have a 'war on piracy', I suppose it is only to be expected that we should soon enough have some of what some elegant coiner of dispassion euphemism though to refer to as "collateral damage"...
Selfishly, I'm inclined to be pleased, in a way. As long as it is possible for people to think that it is 'just about the pirates' or 'the innocent have nothing to fear', acquiescence will be the order of the day. Wholesale and flagrant destruction of bystanders' property should provide a valuable example of how false that thinking is.
The FBI is using the "Nuke 'em from orbit, it's the only way to be sure", offense.
The article says 50,000,000 users, it doesn't say how many files each might have.
If they keep any of them, there might be embarrassing disclosures like un-owned MP3's downloaded by congresspeople and their kids. There might be department of Justice employees with unlicensed software. Even White House staffers might have kinky files.
It would take every FBI agent several years to comb through all that data. It's better for them to just destroy it all.
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
Close, but not entirely. But you do raise an interesting point.
Users who signed up agreed that they had no combacks if they lost data. Users bear all risks of data loss. It gets hairy because this isn't Megaupload deciding to stop operating (as described in that TOS); rather, it's someone else deciding on their behalf. But you're still on a sticky wicket if you already agreed that you shouldn't keep your sole copy on Megaupload and it's your fault if something happens to your data.
But I think that suing the FBI because you claim collateral damage as the result of a criminal investigation isn't likely to find much sympathy.
Besides which, as everyone on Slashdot knows, nothing "real" has been lost.
They froze the assets of a company that hasn't been found guilty of anything yet? Why are they allowed to do that? There is certainly a possibility that MegaUpload will be found not guilty and then who's going to refund the costs, recover the data and refund the lost user fees??
N.B. The Carpathia _saved_ the Titanic survivors.
Welcome to the cloud. If your data is more valuable than the storage space it's written to, then keep your own copy. In this case, it was the government that precipitated the shutdown of a service provider, so everybody's looking to blame them. Who are you going to blame when market dynamics cause a company to just go bankrupt? This reminds me of the outcry that happened when they finally put a bullet in (I believe it was) GeoCities.
Having destroyed the material, how do they prove it was illegal? Even if they can point to a few files, how do they show that the majority of files are infringing (which will be required under US law)?
No, the objective here is simple: put Megaupload out of business, irrespective of what is legal or not. This deletion will put them out of business.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Not for executing the warrant, no. For then destroying the business and causing the destruction of legally stored files before even bothering with a formality of a trial. There is an ethical responsibility to not cause irreparable harm unless/until a guilty verdict is returned. There is also an ethical duty not to cause harm to innocent 3rd parties.
The correct answer is to give everyone a chance to download their data before it is erased.
No, it's like the FBI showing up with the CEO's of walmart in tow, prying the lock off a couple of the storage units and the CO's pointing at random objects and yelling "They stole that, and that, and that..." meanwhile the renters of the storage locker are in China, and the owner of the storage company says "Well they could have gotten that at Target you know... also, how do you know they stole this and didn't actually pay for it? Have you even asked them?" The FBI then arrests the Owner of the storage unit, who now can't pay its utility bills... water, sewer and power are cut off... the buildings catch fire and the FBI tells the fire department "no need to put that out... we have the truth, let the lies burn."
When they come to take your rights away, they start with the people that clearly don't deserve them. When they come for yours, well... it's a little too late then isn't it?
I've run into all of the following in the days since MegaUpload has been down:
Stepmania files for public domain, CC, etc. compositions
Podcast
Video coverage of an event
Rip of (public) art/drawing stream
There would also be quite a bit of original as-seen-on-youtube music, but thankfully that usually ends up on Mediafire. Quite frankly I can't imagine the last time I downloaded something not CC, public domain, or clearly free use from such a service. While I won't pretend that sites like MegaUpload don't have pirated content or that it's not some of the most popular stuff on them, suggesting they don't have plenty of legitimate files is extremely ignorant.
They typically start with making sure that defendant cannot afford a lawyer? I guess this is a good way to ensure guilty verdict.
---
If you use a provider to archive old data to free up some space, how would you get it back if it's destroyed?
So, bye bye, iCloud et. al. ...
Like a good neighbor, fsck is there
They froze the assets of a company that hasn't been found guilty of anything yet? Why are they allowed to do that?
That's RICO for ya, baby.
Don't get me wrong, I am of the opinion that the government is in the wrong here. I merely pointed out an inaccuracy in an analogy. This is commonplace here you know...
I fight for my rights, I don't see many that do. I wore a uniform, I shipped overseas, I operated on behalf of our government thinking that I was defending the rights of U.S. citizens. Today i fight with my signature, my vote and my sway with others. The U.S. government or any government can come after me and try to take my rights, but they won't get them without a fight.
Yeah, but then it decided to go up against the Romans...
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
Companies go bankrupt overnight routinely.
It's a typical endgame of a grift.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
The trouble is that regardless of whether or not the uploader has a copy, losing the cloud copy is still a loss to the people it was intended for. Perhaps it could be replaced by the uploader or someone who downloaded it previously, but there is no guarantee of this... People move on, forget that email's password, die, etc. While this loss may not be _actionable_ (e.g. a by a lawsuit), it's foolish to pretend it's not a loss all the same.
(And that's not even covering all the effort lost to simply reupoading and correcting the links for all the files you already had uploaded.)
Geocities is actually a perfect example. We had notice and special effort was made to preserve the data being lost:
http://www.archive.org/web/geocities.php
And then coming to your house, fucking your wife in the butt
Well, someone's gotta do it.
Except when it impacts customers in other countries where the laws are different. See, in Canada the FBI doing this falls under the clause of causing mischief. Regardless of whether or not there's an ongoing criminal investigation. This is one of the reasons why if your data is taken in canada, your data is safe in canada. If the US government wants to play the 'we can reach across the border and do shit'
Per 430CC
Mischief in relation to data
(1.1) Every one commits mischief who wilfully
(a) destroys or alters data;
(b) renders data meaningless, useless or ineffective;
(c) obstructs, interrupts or interferes with the lawful use of data; or
(d) obstructs, interrupts or interferes with any person in the lawful use of data or denies access to data to any person who is entitled to access thereto.
Well...they might get a nasty surprise. Since our extradition treaty covers mischief, and the arrest and deportation of individuals back to canada to stand trial. In Canada mischief can be carried into IO(that's felony for americans)territory regarding the rendering of data being unusable.
Om, nomnomnom...
Megaupload is a Hong Kong based company. The only reason they were charged in the US was because they used servers for hosting in the US. This pretty much sends a message to anyone who might do business in the States that they are not welcome, and that justice is pretty much bought and sold by how much money and influence you have. This is not a good message to be sending out to businesses overseas, looking to invest here. Freezing a foreign company's assets worldwide over what is a domestic issue is going to give a lot of international entrepreneurs reasons to look elsewhere.
Kim Dotcom did the smart thing- he made sure there was a time limit set on his user's data if someone bigger than his company came along and tried to forcibly take it. By the time someone shutting down his operations finally figured out where the real data was held, all of it is going to be deleted- unless they return his funds and let him continue to operate. Damned if they do shut him down, because now he and his company are a damaged party and the US takes a hit in the international markets, damned if they don't shut him down completely, because then the Feds look weak and ineffectual.
Exculpatory evidence and discovery for the trial are irreparably damaged by the Prosecution, the Defendants can now sue in civil and international court for damages (whether they see them or not), and Kim Dotcom may even become a cause celebre. That is, if the US doesn't hold him indefinitely under the NDAA...
There goes the cloud industry.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
. . .use steganography to embed the data in a compromising picture of yourself and then upload it to Facebook. Presto -- it will be there forever.
The A-team had stories like this all time, small nice family company being muscled out of business by big evil company.
The US constitution provisions for protection of the individual are NOT as many think to get the guilty off but to protect the average innocent citizen from being bullied into submission.
The principle is simple, if I want to stop you, I can have you arrested and your crops will rot on your farm, your will unable to supply your customers, you will run out of cash and bam, I can buy your farm cheap... I don't need to have you found guilty as long as I can keep you under arrest for long enough. There are plenty of variants on this, in corrupt countriest the way to get a bribe as a custom officer is to hold up the goods of a company for inspection until they either pay or go out of business for being unable to deliver.
This is even done on a country scale. Romania did not like that The Netherlands is blocking Romania becoming part of the EU free labor traffic, they claim this is racist (Romania is one of the worsed human rights abusers in the EU with their treatment of gypsies) and so they blocked dutch product at the border trying to put pressure on the Dutch government. Didn't really work since it only re-inforced the view that Romania is not yet ready to fully join the EU.
But the tactic itself remains, get the police to smash your opponents goods during a search and force them out of business.
Megaupload itself is shady enough but then the content industry has many accusations against it as well, just that he who pays the piper determines who ends up in court or not. How many settlements has the content industry agreed to to avoid being found guilty in open court? Quite a few in the last couple of decades.
There are lots of filesharing methods, the error Megaupload made was trying to go semi-legit... artists had publicly voiced their support for a new scheme Megaupload wanted to introduce... coincidence that the very next week they are put out of operation by the rent-a-cop FBI? Maybe and Saddam considering selling oil in Euro's just a bit before being removed from power had nothing to do with it... first Iraq war was over the conquering and subjegation of another nation and he was left in power unharmed. He considers undermining the dollar and BAM, he swings.
And gosh, all the oil nations that consider dealing in euro's are on the danger list to... how amazing a coincidence.
You can destroy someone in the courts without ever needing to find them guilty. But if history has shown us anything, their will be 10 megauploads to take this ones place and they will be harder to take down. And they will not bother trying to go legit or try to work with artists. They will just copy all and damn the rest. Want to download files right now and not deal with filetubes with endless vapor ware? Go russian. I tried to find some old ebooks, go west and it all leads to overpriced book sellers, go russian and you find entire libraries with no popups, no spam, no search bars, just simple downloads. Because nobody in Russia gives a fuck. If the FBI tried the same as they did in New Zealand their officers would come back in body bags and asking the former KGB to investigate would be very ironic indeed.
They took down napster which led to the demise of cutemx on which anime was shared... and all that happened is that you now got anime torrent sites that are run so smoothly they release automatic updates and actually have an rating system telling if there is a better version out there for series 10-20 years old (torrents for new stuff are easy but finding a very old series with 20-30+ seeders and only leeching... that is class).
It is like stomping ants, only these don't just come back in greater number, they come back stronger and fiercer... and if I am a typical person, their users come back a little bit more reluctant to buy from the RIAA/MPAA every again. It ain't just being cheap anymore, now it is a case of principle!
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
OK, let's play this game.
Let's say that U2 has a new song that's almost out. It gets leaked (somehow) to the internet. Bono sends a copy to Edge on MegaUpload so that he can play it for a performer from their opening act so that they can hear it and end their act with a song that's not too similar. U2's manager sends a copy to an advertising agency to use in a commercial. The band sends a copy to the execs at Island Records so that they can send it to radio stations. Also, a pirate makes it and the Megaupload link available for download.
The lawyers for U2's label (rightfully) demand immediate takedown for the pirate link, because it's being used for piracy. How many of the 4 copies are illegal?
The answer is probably one. MegaUpload would be right to leave the other 3 identical copies alone. This is the problem with copyright infringement claims. The files don't come with dossiers explaining who is and is not allowed to listen to it. That's why copyright and fair use must be decided in a court of law.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
And neither one actually erases anything. foremost or some other data recovery tool could find a lot of files.
Innocent until PROVEN guilty? Why can the money (and the lawyers it could buy) be taken away before the trial even begins?
Megaupload hasn't been proven guilty yet. If they are not allowed to pay their creditors to stop their users data being deleted it is effectively destroying the company beyond repair based on an opinion since there has been no trial yet.
So we just need Anonymous to DoS their servers first?
Sure. The Nazis had funnier accents (citation: Hogan's Heroes).
Not really true. Canada law looks at the full chain of events along with the aggravating and mitigating circumstances of the charge. If a case is before the courts, but there isn't enough prohibitive cause in our system to keep something offline. Then you're denying the right of paid customers to access their data. Which means you're denying access. You're welcome to believe whatever you want, but US law != law everywhere. And Canadian law says not legal, until it goes through the courts.
The laws in other places do not allow you to arbitrarily to do something without considering the full actions. This is why here, you can't simply walk up and seize the assets of someone even if they're convicted of running a drug operation. You need to prove to the crown that, those assets were purchased and profited by the proceeds of crime, and you must prove it to the judge as well.
Om, nomnomnom...
Except nobody in your country's leadership has the balls to do any of that, so this is all a moot point
Megaupload was the only known location of the videos accompanying http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/54/poker-beats-brags-variance/bbv-grossest-craziest-night-my-life-very-graphic-tl-mr-240866/
It would be a travesty if these were lost!