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Three Execs Get Prison Time For Pirating Oracle Firmware & Solaris OS Update (bleepingcomputer.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Three of four TERiX executives were sentenced to prison yesterday for a scheme through which they created three fake companies to pirate Oracle firmware patches and Solaris OS updates. By doing this, the execs avoided paying a per-server fee for every Oracle product their company serviced, instead paying for one patch/update alone.
Court documents show that Oracle was aware of the scheme and eventually connected the dots between the fake companies and TERiX when one of the execs downloaded files from Oracle's servers via one of the fake company's accounts from a TERiX IP address. Oracle filed a complaint with the FBI, but also a civil suit. A judge awarded Oracle damages last year totaling $57.423 million. The judge also barred TERiX from servicing Oracle products.
Court documents show that Oracle was aware of the scheme and eventually connected the dots between the fake companies and TERiX when one of the execs downloaded files from Oracle's servers via one of the fake company's accounts from a TERiX IP address. Oracle filed a complaint with the FBI, but also a civil suit. A judge awarded Oracle damages last year totaling $57.423 million. The judge also barred TERiX from servicing Oracle products.
First time seeing this here
Seriously, now I need to go get an insurance policy to pay out if Oracle sticks me with criminal charges? Sounds like this should have been purely a civil matter.
TERiX CEO: So, what are you in for?
Cellmate: I stabbed my mother to death, then fed her remains to a pack of coyotes that live in my neighborhood. And you?
TERiX CEO: I gave away firmware and OS software patches without paying the necessary service royalties to Oracle.
Fake billing old people is a much safer crime.
Used to be free. I remember the file names were something like Update_9.tar.gz or something like that. They all had the same file name for any given OS.
I think there is a difference between profiting off of distributing pirated software, as this was the case, and normal piracy (especially media piracy). I'm not upset with this outcome.
Not CEO, just EO - cannon fodder.
If you steal from the Oracle you get hurt.
This gets prison time? The entire US Economy was crashed in 2008 by people lying about the value of derivatives and _this_ is what we send people to jail for?
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FTFY.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
only if you do money laundering you go that place. In the other one more like
I ripped off A bunch of old people with my phone scam
Yet one more reason why I won't do business with Oracle. These updates and firmware use to be free, now they're throwing people in prison because they got free updates that fixed Oracle's shitty products. Screw HPE too... Dell still offers free unencumbered firmware updates.
If you cannot afford to pay for Oracle firmware, say to them "I have n customers on Oracle, how about I get these patches for free or I will go to SQLServer, DB/2, postfix, mariadb etc...". And just work the deal
That will just further alienate Oracle's customers and hasten the demise of Solaris and SPARC
Hmm..
When I was eight-year-old, we lived in a large hut made of uncooked brick, seven siblings of us plus our father, our mother, an aunt and three cousins.
One week-end our dad set up a rogue Windows Update server to proxy our updates on the LAN, WSUS something, but without paying for the Windows Server 2003 or 2008 license. The next couple of weeks allowed us actual Windows XP security while saving a lot of Internet bandwith among our computers. It was great. We celebrated with a tournament of 4-player MS Hearts, which had become a little goofy ritual after our dad introduced us to 10BaseT networking.
Two weeks after, five or six warlords equipped with machetes and AKs made irruption and massacred every single member of my family, as I was hiding behind a couch.
The amount of blood was so breathtaking. I never thought blood would pool that way, even LAN battles and co-op with Glquake and Winquake didn't prepare me, and the mud floor was vainly trying to soak it.
You can only imagine how life-changing and horrifying this event was. But life is life. It taught me many a lesson. But no matter the hardship, you gotta follow software licenses and copyright law to the letter. I am glad in a way my family was executed, even if I suffered obviously a decade of squalor.
yeah, commercial software is a theft. Use FOSS.
I have been saying this for a few years now ever since the Java lawsuit against Google that no one is a bigger threat to innovation, FOSS, and software development freedom than Oracle.
Their products suck, buggy, ultra expensive, and require contracts which are leased rather than rented with SAAS with all sorts of stipulations.
MS on the other hand is moving in the other direction but still have a ways to go. Windows being free for non commercial use is one example and unlike Oracle their products are at least improving. Oracle is going the other way around and throwing people in jail who want a bug fix.
The most outdated shit requiring insecure IE and ancient versions of Windows on desktops is all because of fucking Oracle because they charge an arm and a leg to upgrade so Java6 (last employer) is still being used with customer financial data all because Oracle wants to charge too much money to upgrade that the cost accountants won't pay. .... end rant
http://saveie6.com/
Actual CEO. There's a Bloomberg profile on this guy.
My president told me that the Chinese stole our technology, and when I read the headline I thought they have caught 3 fucking Chinese scum and have thrown them into the slammer.
How disappointed I am when I saw their names CEO Bernd Appleby with executives Sevanna, Summit, and Wex
None of them were Chinese !!
Why are they catching and punishing Americans for the crime my President told me the fucking Chinese are doing to us??
They won't encounter anyone like that. These execs will be placed in with similar offense criminals. They don't pile petty and white collar criminals in with the murderers and rapists.
Their director of sales only got one day, so he wouldn't even go to prison, just jail.
you can't lie about investments. There was tons of shady crap going on to hide the fact that those derivatives were made up of worthless loans to people who were bound to default. Most of the really bad loans were to house flippers and the like who had no incentive to keep the properties since they didn't live in them.
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who ran as a Democrat. He moved the Democratic party hard right so he could forge an alliance of economically right wing social librals and so he could get that sweet sweet Wallstreet money. The worst thing is that when he moved the Dems to the right the Rs had to follow suit in order to maintain their identity. That's how we got crazy shit like the Tea Partiers (well that and a ton of money from the Koch Bros.)
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They made the software unavailable for everyone else and deleted the originals from Oracle's servers?
Fuck me, they're some good hackers.
Using such a crappy language ought to be a crime too.
"Too soon"
I used to deal with oracle crap.
Perhaps one day I will see the funny side of this
I guess you haven't been their and haven't seen over crowding, they got you brainwashed good.
For withholding firmware fixes and OS updates that fixes security holes that their incompetence but there. Gimme a fix or gimme a full refund!
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... for skimping out on paying a little upfront for an independent IT consultant and some scripting jobs on a Linux/Postgres setup.
Bottom line: Steer clear of Oracle. There is nothing Oracle can do that countless Foss stops can't do better and way cheaper.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Oracle should have just contacted them like a normal company and said stop that or we'll sue. And, then Terix would have cut it out and paid the license fees. In the long run, Oracle stood to make more than the court judgement from continued legitimate Terix business. But, Oracle is a litigation happy business and wanted to make an example of someone. All it does is convince me more to never use their software at all costs, and recommend my clients not to use them either. It isn't just this particular case either, they've been pretty dirty handed about Java and a number of other products as well. They aren't winning any hearts and minds with this stuff, and I think they don't care. The rest of us can tell you're a prick and don't care about your customers, Oracle.
You don't know what you're talking about, boy. Real life isn't like your movies. They absolutely do not mix the minor criminals with the serious ones. They might have a pod full of blues with a couple of yellows or a pod full of yellows with a couple of reds, but they will never place blues in with reds or a couple of yellows in with a pod full of reds.
Now go back to your video games and cartoons.
I think that is what Oracle wanted, to set an example. Don't play by the rules and this could be your company.
Bare in mind that the people responsible for this were the ones running the company, it isn't that unusual for the actions of the CEO to bankrupt the company.
And yes, this is a good reason to completely avoid Oracle's software. And don't forget that ORACLE is an acronym for One Rich Asshole Called Larry Ellison.
Look - you just can't do this kind of crap without greasing the palms of the necessary politicians.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
This is a good case of why not to use Oracle, use MySQL or Postgres
Cellmate 2: I ran youtube-dl to download the latest Britney Spears song
and shared it with my friends.
Cellmate 3: (stabs oracle cellmate to death with shards of a plastic spoon because he was showing weakness)
Oh wait, were we playing "pretend prison"?
Bri-?..man you're old
What if it was "Justin Bieber song " or "Taylor Swift song?"
TERiX CEO: So, what are you in for?
Cellmate: I stabbed my mother to death, then fed her remains to a pack of coyotes that live in my neighborhood. And you?
TERiX CEO: I gave away firmware and OS software patches without paying the necessary service royalties to Oracle.
Cellmate #2: "Yeah, well, I colluded with the Russians to get voted into office."
Your parents fucked up raising you. You are really fucking dumb if you think stealing only means a single, physical possession. Clearly, you don't have any ideas worth stealing nor have lived in the real world.
"As the head of TERiX’s executive management team and 70 percent co-owner of the company, Appleby was responsible for all aspects of the business," US Attorney Glassman said. "He designed the conspiracy and its evolution over almost 10 years, and understood and directed all aspects of the criminal activity. As the scheme was uncovered, he instructed other company employees to devise ways to avoid detection."
Name Title Sentence
Bernd D. Appleby CEO and Founder 24 months in prison and two years of supervised release and ordered to pay a $100,000 fine
James A. Olding COO and Founder 12 months and one day in prison, three years of supervised release and a $50,000 fine
Lawrence E. Quinn Director of Sales One day in prison, two years of supervised release and a $5,000 fine
Jason T. Joyce Director of Technical Services 24 months of probation and a $5,000 fine
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