9 Domain Names Seized in Fight Against Internet Theft
June 30, 2010, 3:26 pm
By MICHAEL CIEPLY
As part of a new initiative against Internet theft of intellectual property, federal officials on Wednesday said they had seized nine domain names of Web sites that were found to be offering first-run movies.
The seizures were announced in Los Angeles by the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York.
Seven of the targeted sites were seized by federal officials in New York, though the action was disclosed during the announcement of the new initiative ? called ?Operation in Our Sites? ? at a press conference on the Walt Disney Studios lot in Burbank, Calif.
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Domain names that were seized included Tvshack.net, Movies-links.tv, Filespump.com, Now-moivies.com, Planetmoviez.com, Thepiratecity.org, Zml.com, Ninjavideo.net and Ninjathis.net, the federal officials said.
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http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/30/in-anti-theft-effort-officials-seize-9-domain-names/
Feds, studios join forces against piracy
Officials seize domain names of sites offering movies
By Alex Ben Block
June 30, 2010, 02:11 PM ET
Updated: June 30, 2010, 05:21 PM ET
Hollywood studio and industry executives have joined with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S, Attorney for the Southern District of New York to launch Operation in our Sites, an initiative aimed at stopping Internet counterfeiting and piracy.
During a news conference Wednesday on a soundstage at Disney Studios, the feds announced that they have kicked off the effort by seizing nine Internet domain names of websites offering first-run movies, often within hours of their release.
ICE investigators and the Department of Homeland Security also have seized assets from 15 banks, PayPal and advertising accounts and moved on four residential search warrants in four states.
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The seized domain names are tvshack.net, movies-links.tv, filespump.com, now-movies.com, planetmoviez.com, thepiratecity.org and zml.com.
Also seized were the domain names and website content of ninjavideo.net and ninjathis.net, which generated revenue from ads and donations.
Alan Bergman, president of the Walt Disney Studios, told attendees that this is no small matter to Hollywood.
"Enforcing these laws is critical and allows these companies to continue their investment" in the production of movies and television shows," he said.
And it is not just a problem for the entertainment industry, added John Morton, assistant secretary of ICE.
"Internet crooks are undermining the U.S. economy on a grand scale," said Morton, calling the new coalition of private and public partners "a long-term effort to turn the corner on these thieves."
Morton and other speakers made clear that piracy has a devastating effect on the entertainment industry. "Every time you download, you hurt American workers in the film and television industry, not just fat cats in the corporate suites. The traffic to these sites is growing at an alarming rate," he said.
Mike Robinson, senior vp of the MPAA, said that as broadband proliferates, so does piracy. He said already peer-to-peer traffic, much of it moving content illegally, already represents 39% of all the Internet traffic worldwide. He said the problems are growing rapidly, with an increase of 45% in the last quarter of 2009 alone.
Robinson said while they are fighting pirates, they also continue efforts to aide those building and operating legitimate sites to distribute their content.
Frederick Huntsberry, COO of Paramount Pictures, called Wednesday's announcement "vastly important, yet only the tip of the iceberg" in terms of the efforts needed.
Huntsberry said show business is "threatened to its very core by the onslaught of piracy."
He said the biggest new threat is the use of cyber lockers, where visitors can come in and grab content to use in a way that is very hard to track and very easy to use.
He also said consumers need to know that when they go to illegal sites, they not only support organized crime and criminals of all kinds, but also open themselves to danger from spyware, identify theft and those who would go into their computers and steal their files.
Kathy Garmezy, associate executive director at the DGA, said, "Internet theft is not a victimless crime. In reality it has a very real impact and is a direct threat on the ability of hundreds of thousands to make a living."
Garmezy said one of the biggest effects is on the aftermarket use of movies and TV which generate the residuals which fund 70% of the DGA pension. "Our members are dependent on this downstream revenue as they go from job to job," she said.
Asked how this initiative was different for the past, Morton said this time it is not case by case, or for a limited time. It is a broad effort that will continue over time. "We face a whole new class of violators and we will be back at it over and over," said Morton.
"There are thousands of these sites. This is just a first step."
Feds, studios join forces against piracy
Officials seize domain names of sites offering movies
By Alex Ben Block
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BURBANK, Calif. ? U.S. officials on Wednesday announced a major crackdown on movie piracy that involved disabling nine websites that were offering downloads of pirated movies in some cases hours after they appeared in theaters.
Officials also seized assets from 15 bank, investment and advertising accounts, and executed residential search warrants in North Carolina, New Jersey, New York and Washington.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials worked with the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York and other government agencies. The investigation involved about 100 agents in 11 states and the Netherlands.
Officials wouldn't say how many people were suspected of intellectual property theft, but said the penalties could include prison time.
The raids were the first actions in a new "Operation In Our Sites" initiative to combat Internet counterfeiting and piracy.
The government only seized domain names for the sites in question, however, meaning the computers that run the sites could still be used under a different name.
Acknowledging the slippery nature of online piracy, John Morton, the assistant secretary of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said government agents would have to be persistent in chasing site operators.
"If a site reappears, so will we. If the criminals move overseas, we will follow," he said at a press conference on the studio lot of The Walt Disney Co. "Take it from me, I don't think that we've stopped Internet piracy in a day, but this is going to be a sustained effort."
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The domain names seized were: TVShack.net, PlanetMoviez.com, ThePirateCity.org, Movies-Links.TV, FilesPump.com, Now-Movies.com, ZML.com, NinjaVideo.net and NinjaThis.net. All the sites' domain names were registered in the U.S., although one was physically based in the Netherlands.
Officials said the sites would be disabled. As of Wednesday afternoon, several of the sites checked by The Associated Press were still functioning. The ICE said it would take about a day before all the sites would show a banner saying the domain name had been seized.
Morton said there were hundreds of similar websites infringing on copyrights.
The conference was also attended by executives from Disney, Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures, the Directors Guild of America, Motion Picture Association of America and the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, which covers behind-the-scenes workers in the movie industry.
U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said in a statement that money lost because of copyright infringement translates into lost jobs. The MPAA said film and television production supports 2.4 million American jobs and contributes $80 billion a year to the economy.
"That's why we took the actions that we did," Bharara said in a statement. "If your business model is movie piracy, your story will not have a happy ending."
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/30/movie-piracy-websites-sei_n_631192.html
Copyright law does accept that host sites are not directly responsible for the material posted. HOWEVER, it does require them to take reasonable efforts to remove copyright material on application by the legitimate owner. If a site does NOT have such a process, they are complicit in the crime.
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