piracy

Ofcom, the U.K. communications regulator, published draft code today that would require ISPs to notify suspected pirates via "copyright infringement reports."

Such reports would tell the ISP customers that their Web activity is being monitored, inform them of ways to find legal online content, such as through paid services, and alert them that they could face legal action as a result of infringing copyright.

Today's draft code puts the U.K.'s Digital Economy Act, a law aimed at curbing piracy, into action via a three-strike system, or "graduated response."

Under Ofcom's draft code, … Read more

In January, MegaUpload founder Kim DotCom was little more than antipiracy road kill.

Six months later, DotCom is making a comeback.

The United States accused MegaUpload, a once popular cloud storage locker, of being a massive piracy operation. Seven company managers, including DotCom were charged with criminal copyright violations, conspiracy, money laundering and wire fraud. The defendants denied wrongdoing but they seemed headed for long prison sentences.

A month after his arrest, DotCom was still locked up in jail. His assets had all been seized. His family had been booted out of his home. Since then, however, DotCom and some … Read more

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has come to the defense of MegaUpload founder Kim DotCom.

DotCom is accused by the United States of operating MegaUpload as a piracy enterprise and is fighting an attempt to extradite him from New Zealand to the U.S. (Here is an update about how DotCom's side has seized the momentum in the case.)

Last week, DotCom generated some press by posting a photo to the Web of himself and Wozniak standing together. But Wozniak had yet to comment about the photo or whether he believes DotCom is in the right.

In an exclusive e-mail … Read more

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales has launched an online petition to stop the extradition of a 24-year-old British student to the U.S. for alleged criminal copyright violations.

The U.S. Department of Justice has been attempting to extradite Richard O'Dwyer to face criminal copyright charges for allegedly linking to copies of copyrighted films through TVShack.net, a crowd-sourced site that has been seized by the Department of Homeland Security. O'Dwyer faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.

In an article penned for The Guardian, Wales called O'Dwyer the "human face" a global battle … Read more

An Indian court has decided to clarify a previous order that saw entire Web sites taken down for fear of a single movie being pirated.

India's Medianama is reporting today that the Madras High Court recently limited a badly drafted April ruling on the subject. The court said in its updated ruling, according to Medianama, which obtained a copy of it, that "the interim injunction is granted only in respect of a particular URL where the infringing movie is kept and not in respect of the entire website. Further, the applicant is directed to inform about the particulars … Read more

MegaUpload's request to dismiss criminal copyright charges should be denied, the U.S. Attorney's office said yesterday in a court filing.

Claims made by MegaUpload two weeks ago that the U.S. government has no jurisdiction over the Hong Kong-based cloud-storage service are untrue, according to the document filed by Neil MacBride, U.S. Attorney for Eastern District of Virginia.

In January, MacBride's office indicted MegaUpload, founder Kim DotCom, and six other men connected to the company. The U.S. accused the group of operating the company as a front for a massive piracy scheme that made … Read more

Piggybacking (waka waka) on Jeff's encounter with a candied bacon ice cream sandwich at the Sony E3 press conference last week, we can't help but indulge in Burger King's new bacon-topped sundae.

And even if Jeff's dietitian won't let him have it, we can still stare longingly at the press shots and tell you about our own favorite encounters with the swine.… Read more

NEW YORK -- No one hooted or jeered when Cary Sherman took the stage today at the Personal Democracy Forum 2012.

That's worth noting, because Sherman is CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America, the trade group of the top four recording companies, and because the forum crowd was full of politically minded techies that -- it's safe to say -- feel some antipathy for the RIAA. OK, some of these people downright hate the RIAA.

All you have to do to measure the degree of animosity for the RIAA is read the user comments of any … Read more

The two lawmakers who spearheaded a protest in January against controversial antipiracy legislation said today that they want the country to adopt an Internet Bill of Rights.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), said today at the Personal Democracy Forum 2012 in New York that the country needs a way to guarantee citizens their Internet freedoms.

"What we need is a way to measure how we're going to ensure the voice of [Internet] networks is protected," Wyden said during an interview the two lawmakers gave to Andrew Rasiej, an entrepreneur and founder of the … Read more