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FBI Used FedEx To Sneak Dotcom's Hard Drives Out of NZ
First time accepted submitter bpkiwi writes "FBI agents, working with New Zealand police on the Megaupload case, took a copy of Kim Dotcom's hard drives and then immediately sneaked out of the police facility and FedEx'ed them back to the USA. Despite the fact that removal of evidence in this manner without official approval (and a chance for the defendant to challenge it) appears to be illegal, the New Zealand government is now left arguing on a technicality — that the law only covers 'physical' items." Things got slightly better for Megaupload users trying to get their files back today. In a court filing the MPAA said users can have their files back as long as access to copyrighted files is blocked. “The MPAA Members are sympathetic to legitimate users who may have relied on Megaupload to store their legitimately acquired or created data, although the Megaupload terms of use clearly disclaimed any guarantee of continued access to uploaded materials,” MPAA lawyers write.
: "Considering that you helped a foreign power conspire to break NZ law, why should we allow you to continue to work in our country?"
To which the answer would be something like : "Because we're a hideously rich gigantic corporation operating out of your lord and master the US, suck it Kiwis."
Admit nothing. Deny Everything. Make Counter-accusations.
Oh, it's funnier than that.
From TFA:
"FBI agents who copied data from Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom's computers and took it overseas were not acting illegally because information isn't "physical material", the Crown says."
Copying information is theft when MPAA says it is, but copying information is not theft when the NZ Feds, acting on FBI's behalf, who themselves were acting on MPAA's behalf, say it isn't!
How would FedEx know? You may as well blame Level 3 for illegal export of bits.
Ah, so making a copy isn't stealing? :P
This article puts quite a different spin on it, http://www.nzherald.co.nz/technology/news/article.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10811266 From the article: "He said he had contacted the agents to offer to take clones of the items to the United States Embassy only to find they had already sent the clones to the US." Sounds like the NZ cops were going to give it to the FBI but the FBI wasn't waiting from permission anyway.
FedEx aided in copying data illegally. FedEx should have filters in place blocking any illegal items (or data) from passing through their services, thus stopping companies and people from breaking the law. /SARCASM
Law enforcement agencies and cooperating entities send evidence via FedEx all the time. It's an accepted mode of transit. As for chain of custody, sorry, you're wrong there too, as long as it was properly documented. As for legally acceptable means of obtaining the materials (in this case, copies of data stored on hard drives, presumably bit-for-bit images of the drive contents), well, they're federal agents who I'm sure signed affidavits attesting to the means utilized to create the copies. Whether or not NZ decides it was okay is up to NZ, but will probably have little to no effect on proceedings in the US.
Now, on to the really important point. Where did you get your legal and/or law enforcement experience? I suspect it may have been a crackerjack box. Sorry, old episodes of Law and Order don't count.
Write failed: Broken pipe
We poke fun at rich people for hypocrisy like this. And yet....they get away with it...
I would be asking FedEx some pretty hard questions. Like: "Considering that you helped a foreign power conspire to break NZ law, why should we allow you to continue to work in our country?"
WTF?
So you want FedEx prosecuted in every country for millions of crimes?
You seriously want to bust FedEx because they were the shipper?
Sure why blame the people shipping shit out of a country illegally when you can just bring down the hammer on FedEx.
How did you get an insightful mod with that crap in there?
You prosecute the agents or you penalize the country. You don't go after FedEx or UPS or DHL because the agents used them as a shipper.
Should FedEx have asked if the hard drives were stolen evidence? Do you think that should be one of the check boxes on the shipping form?
I can not fathom how it is possible for you to say that and be smart enough to type. I can only come to the conclusion that you put no thought whatsoever into any part of the drivel that spewed froth from your keyboard.
Next time think about what it is you are saying before you hit submit.
Why is it so hard to only have politicians for a few years, then have them go away?
Like: "Considering that you helped a foreign power conspire to break NZ law, why should we allow you to continue to work in our country?"
I can imagine FedEx's response.
"What are you suggesting? That we open every FedEx package we ship out? To check against some kind of real-time up-to-second list provided by the police department for what's already in their evidence locker?
What happens if we don't do that? Are you going to arrest us and freeze all our assets too? Wouldn't it be easier to just put a lock on your evidence locker and carefully vet/punish the people who took out the evidence in the first place? Or at least punish/fire/jail the people who gave them access to that locker? "
First, chain of custody refers to the ability to prove that the materials presented in court were seized by the police at a particular time and place. It is different from the question of whether the means to seize the evidence or move it from one country to another is legal. If someone can attest to the movement of the evidence, then chain of custody is satisfied, even if normal procedures are not followed. Of course, if normal procedures are not followed, then the defense can put that before the finder of fact and argue the evidence is unreliable. But to be admissible, it is only necessary that the prosecution offer evidence to show where and when a particular item was seized.
Moreover, even if the chain of custody was broken, fruit of the poisonous tree would not apply to derivative evidence unless the same chain of custody problem infected that new evidence. So, for example, if chain of custody problems keep a gun from being used, it is still possible in many situations to admit evidence seized under a warrant for which probable cause is supported by that gun. Not always - some chain of custody problems would quash the warrant - but there are many situations where the gun would out but fruits of the warrant would be in.
Yeah that "fair use" you talk of only applies under US jurisdiction. Here in New Zealand we are a separate country and we have our own laws. So your American FBI can not just come over here and apply your own set of rules in our sovereign country thank you!!
The FBI broke a court order in NZ that stipulated that a further hearing would be required to decide if the FBI where going to be given access at all. They just copied and stole the information without even the NZ Police knowing what they where doing.
If the content on the hard-drive was original work in any way, it's copyright is automatically legally owned by, and remains with, the creators (As laid out in the Berne Convention), unless they somehow disown or reassign copyright on those items (though a recording or publishing contract, or any other kind of license, for example). Uploading works (files) to a locker site is not disowning copyright, it is merely granting an exclusive license for the locker site to hold (and potentially "transform") them, not a right to distribute those works to third parties (unless said third parties are explicitly granted access). Thus, the New Zealand Police and FBI (And potentially the MPAA/RIAA as well) are guilty of illegally copying copyrighted works without a license, thus infringing on the copyrights of all the users of MegaUpload.
Therefore, in one fell swoop, the FBI are immediately guilty of 1+ Billion cases of Copyright Infringement, assuming every registered user of MegaUpload uploaded only one original work. If, for some reason, they are not, then neither are the users of MegaUpload guilty, for exactly the same reasons.
Should be interesting to see the US Government wiggle their way out of that one, to be sure.
Hate to bust your bubble buddy but American police as far a New Zealand or any other countries laws are concerned are nothing but bloody tourists. It is illegal to hand over evidence to visting tourists and let them take it out of the country. It even gets more stupid, users can have their files back as long as access to copyrighted files is blocked, WTF! Just because I am not an American and not a member of the RIAA/MPAA/Obama Justice Department club for pigopolists all of a sudden my work is no longer protected by copyright, talk about bullshit. All that work on those drives is protected by copyright, so what the fuck are they talking about, just because a bunch of out of control Fucking Bloody Idiot tourists stole a copy infringing other peoples copyrights doesn't mean that work now permanently loses copyright protection.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen