Megaupload Blames U.S. Government For Massive Data Wipe

[McMullen]

Many moany people commenting about me. lol. End of the day, the legal users were screwed by that site allowing illegal downloads etc. Dont moan at me, moan at them. They allowed illegal content on their site thus they screwed over the legal users. Moan at them for a refund, but everyone new that site had illegal downloads on it so grow up and stop moaning. It sucks that people lost legal stuff, but its not like they are naive and didnt know what that site was like.

The precedent that would set is that all services of all types could be shut down and the legitimate users held responsible for any losses they incur as a result. Consider also that some people, contractors for example, might not prefer to use Megaupload but must do so anyway because their clients prefer it. Are they to blame for the huge financial losses they could incur as a result?

At the very least, the US government could have handled it a lot better. As it is, they have done a great deal of damage to a lot of people, and it was entirely avoidable.

 

[KeyMaster45]

Alot of there stuff they had was illegal and pirated stuff wasn't it? So they can hardly complain stuff was deleted illegally when they allowed people to upload illegal stuff. Funny how criminals break the law to make money, but then quote the law when it suits them.

A lot is not the same as all, and you can't possibly know that. No one is a criminal yet because no one has been officially put on trail.

This is just another shitty move in the massive list of shitty moves by the US this last month. So ashamed I live in this country.

Yup, it's becoming quite the list. Let's see: Russia, China(Blaming these two for helping Snowden), the entirety of Latin America(giving false data to prevent the Bolivian president from returning home), Europe(bugging pretty much all EU diplomats, PRISM)... the US has now pissed off what, 50% off the world in the past two weeks?

It's pretty impressive isn't it? We've accumulated about as much bad PR as we have in the last 10 years in a short 14 days. Plus it's kinda funny to watch the office of president be brutally shown to be the useless figurehead position it really is.

 

[Baldr]

Alot of there stuff they had was illegal and pirated stuff wasn't it? So they can hardly complain stuff was deleted illegally when they allowed people to upload illegal stuff. Funny how criminals break the law to make money, but then quote the law when it suits them.

So if somebody rents a storage locker and puts heroin in it, everyone else with lockers in the same facility should lose all their stuff when he gets busted?

The government didn't erase the stuff, the company did. When the storage company dumps all the lockers after a bust, you have a beef with the storage company, not the Government.

I believe the idea is that the company did so under coercion from the US Government, making in part culpable for the loss of data. At very least the government should have had it preserved for evidence against Megaupload. But as the accusation goes, they also deleted evidence that can exculpate the company and it's owner, which at absolute best is destruction of evidence.

As of right now there is absolutely no proof of coercion. If proof ever appears, then you can start putting some heat on the Government. If the company broke laws then it all back on the company.

 

[Baldr]

Many moany people commenting about me. lol. End of the day, the legal users were screwed by that site allowing illegal downloads etc. Dont moan at me, moan at them. They allowed illegal content on their site thus they screwed over the legal users. Moan at them for a refund, but everyone new that site had illegal downloads on it so grow up and stop moaning. It sucks that people lost legal stuff, but its not like they are naive and didnt know what that site was like.

Clearly you don't understand legal procedure in these types of cases. Megaupload's content was almost completely user generated. That meant that users could put up whatever they wanted on it. By law, if someone uses the ability to post user generated content to post illegal materials, the owner of the site is not legally liable so long as they did not know about or condone the posting of illegal materials. That last part is the key part of the US' case against Megaupload. What you're saying, basically, is equivalent to saying that, for example, the US government should have the right to take the whole of the Escapist down because one user posts, for example, Child Porn and the Escapist, who hypothetically knew nothing about it, didn't prevent them from doing so.

There is no second thought the Government would shut this site down if the admins did not doing something about it first. That was the whole problem with Megaupload, the admins knew it was occurring and never did anything to stop it.

 

[Mayamellissa]

I miss you, Megaupload... I miss you so much!

 

[Fox12]

Americans are SORE losers...

Very SORE losers

Yeah we really are [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki]

OT:

Wow... Just WOW... "Hey you there fishing in that lake without a license!!!! We do not know where you live so we will burn every house and boat next to or on the lake!!!! OK lets take a look... Innocent,Innocent,Innocent,Innocent..... YEAH WE GOT THE GUY BREAKING THE LAW TOO!!!!!"

Our legal system is so fucking retarded... Next thing you know we will be arresting people for buying water that looks like it is in a beer box....... Awww shit.

I'll probably be crucified for this, but the Hiroshima/Nagasaki attack was actually pretty defendable. Some people have claimed that the Japanese wanted to surrender, but that's been pretty much debunked. The Japanese military was prepared to fight to the end. If the United States had invaded the nation, an estimated 3 million people would have died, as opposed to the 300,000 that died from the blast. More people died in the firebombing campaign of the Japanese capital than died in the atomic blast, the same fire bombing campaigns that had leveled half of Europe. If that campaign had continued, the results would have been far more deadly. The fire bombings just don't have the psychological affects of a nuclear weapon. We also warned the Japanese of out intentions (though we didn't list specific targets).

Keep in mind that the Japanese military basically asked for this. No, I'm not talking about Pearl Harbor, though it was foolish of them to involve another nation in the conflict. Japan seemed to think war with the U.S. was inevitable, when it was not a foregone conclusion. Instead I'm referring to the Japanese war crimes against the Chinese, war crimes so brutal that they put the Nazis to shame. I won't even hint at the horrors committed, but if you want to know more, read The Rape of Nanking for a more detailed account.

Therefore the Japanese refused an unconditional surrender, an attack on mainland Japan would have cost more lives on both sides, and the Japanese had committed horrible atrocities against their enemies. I'm not saying they "deserved" it, but they definitely put themselves in a position where there was almost no other option. Several million deaths is worse than several hundred thousand, and I feel that the event gets undue publicity due to it being the only time that nuclear weapons have ever been used. How many people died in the bombing in Europe? Far more, but people seem to think that it was more justified, so we forget about it.

I think the real villain was the Japanese military, and it's still a tragedy that civilians died in the attack. The U.S. wasn't sinless either, don't get me wrong. We imprisoned the entire Japanese American population due to racism and committed other terrible crimes as well, so we weren't saints. I just don't believe, at that point, that there was another viable option. It's also strange that far worse war crimes were committed by both the Axis and the Allies, but most people seem to forget about them.

 

[Hazy]

Americans are SORE losers...

Very SORE losers

Yeah we really are [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki]

To be fair, we did warn them ahead of time (according to some, I could be wrong, it's sketchy). And, as atrocious as it was, many historians speculate that the number of lives lost would have been far greater than if we hadn't dropped the bomb. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17lkdqoLt44][footnote]That was in poor taste, I'm sorry, but I couldn't resist.[/footnote]

Anyway, moving away from 1940s nuclear catastrophes, The United States needs to stop asserting itself as the police officer of the world.

 

[uncanny474]

Alot of there stuff they had was illegal and pirated stuff wasn't it? So they can hardly complain stuff was deleted illegally when they allowed people to upload illegal stuff. Funny how criminals break the law to make money, but then quote the law when it suits them.

So if somebody rents a storage locker and puts heroin in it, everyone else with lockers in the same facility should lose all their stuff when he gets busted?

The government didn't erase the stuff, the company did. When the storage company dumps all the lockers after a bust, you have a beef with the storage company, not the Government.

When the storage company dumps the lockers because you couldn't pay them (due to all your assets being frozen) and the Government refused to, and when some of the stuff they dumped could have cleared your name, then yeah, your beef is with the Government. Beef in this case meaning mistrial.

 

[Bevin Warren]

Americans are SORE losers...

Very SORE losers

Yeah we really are [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki]

OT:

Wow... Just WOW... "Hey you there fishing in that lake without a license!!!! We do not know where you live so we will burn every house and boat next to or on the lake!!!! OK lets take a look... Innocent,Innocent,Innocent,Innocent..... YEAH WE GOT THE GUY BREAKING THE LAW TOO!!!!!"

Our legal system is so fucking retarded... Next thing you know we will be arresting people for buying water that looks like it is in a beer box....... Awww shit.

I'll probably be crucified for this, but the Hiroshima/Nagasaki attack was actually pretty defendable. Some people have claimed that the Japanese wanted to surrender, but that's been pretty much debunked. The Japanese military was prepared to fight to the end. If the United States had invaded the nation, an estimated 3 million people would have died, as opposed to the 300,000 that died from the blast. More people died in the firebombing campaign of the Japanese capital than died in the atomic blast, the same fire bombing campaigns that had leveled half of Europe. If that campaign had continued, the results would have been far more deadly. The fire bombings just don't have the psychological affects of a nuclear weapon. We also warned the Japanese of out intentions (though we didn't list specific targets).

Keep in mind that the Japanese military basically asked for this. No, I'm not talking about Pearl Harbor, though it was foolish of them to involve another nation in the conflict. Japan seemed to think war with the U.S. was inevitable, when it was not a foregone conclusion. Instead I'm referring to the Japanese war crimes against the Chinese, war crimes so brutal that they put the Nazis to shame. I won't even hint at the horrors committed, but if you want to know more, read The Rape of Nanking for a more detailed account.

Therefore the Japanese refused an unconditional surrender, an attack on mainland Japan would have cost more lives on both sides, and the Japanese had committed horrible atrocities against their enemies. I'm not saying they "deserved" it, but they definitely put themselves in a position where there was almost no other option. Several million deaths is worse than several hundred thousand, and I feel that the event gets undue publicity due to it being the only time that nuclear weapons have ever been used. How many people died in the bombing in Europe? Far more, but people seem to think that it was more justified, so we forget about it.

I think the real villain was the Japanese military, and it's still a tragedy that civilians died in the attack. The U.S. wasn't sinless either, don't get me wrong. We imprisoned the entire Japanese American population due to racism and committed other terrible crimes as well, so we weren't saints. I just don't believe, at that point, that there was another viable option. It's also strange that far worse war crimes were committed by both the Axis and the Allies, but most people seem to forget about them.

Fox12 - I agree with you and so will any competent military historian

 

[Baldr]

There is no second thought the Government would shut this site down if the admins did not doing something about it first. That was the whole problem with Megaupload, the admins knew it was occurring and never did anything to stop it.

Well, apparently people have said that Megaupload was fairly diligent about removing stuff when asked, which is exactly all they are legally obligated to do. It isn't their job to remove any material they think could possibly be copyrighted. The indictment complained that they had extensive provisions for removing child pornography but wouldn't do anything to remove copyrighted material. Well they are two completely different things and removing child pornography (which is always illegal) isn't the same as arbitrarily removing material you think might be copyrighted.

In any case, the whole thing is rather disgusting. The US Government is abusing their power, their reach and their judicial discretion, all the behest of Corporations who believe that Megaupload threatened their business. Why? Because it's easier for them to put pressure on the government to shut them down than it is to provide better products and services for their consumer bases. You can see that in the indictment, the US government was basically on a witch hunt to get Megaupload on something, they even indicted them for using ads on their site, claiming that by doing so they were profiting from criminal activity.

You Americans can't let your government be held hostage by these corporations. Look at SOPA/PIPA/ACTA/CISPA. Those four bills were/are corporate attempts to infringe on your rights in the exact same way that they have infringed on the rights of Megaupload, to exactly the same ends. Piracy is a service problem, and always will be. Copyright infringement is also, and always will be, a civil dispute.

There is such thing as criminal copyright under federal law. United States Code Title 18 Section 2319. Even New Zealand has criminal copyright laws.

I am one of the victims of Megaupload, I put in several complaints against them not taking down my companies copyright material, in which they did nothing about. I'm not some multimillion dollar corporation. They got what they deserved.

 

[Andy Chalk]

The government didn't erase the stuff, the company did. When the storage company dumps all the lockers after a bust, you have a beef with the storage company, not the Government.

A valid point. The problem is that it's the US government preventing Mega from maintaining the data by refusing to unfreeze even just enough cash to settle the matter with Carpathia. According to its lawyer, the US is obliged by precedent to maintain that data if it has de facto control of the servers, and while I have no idea if that's actually true I assume that Dotcom's legal team isn't just making this stuff up - and if so, that makes it a beef with the government.

 

[RicoADF]

The US reaching beyond their borders to enforce their internal legislation? NAAAAAHHHH!

I wonder what the Bolivian president thinks about this.

And Americans wonder why the world hates their country (mostly their government agencies) so much. The US had no right to touch any of the servers unless some were in their country. They seem to think their judge, jury and executioner in every other country.

 

[Baldr]

There is such thing as criminal copyright under federal law. United States Code Title 18 Section 2319. Even New Zealand has criminal copyright laws.

I am one of the victims of Megaupload, I put in several complaints against them not taking down my companies copyright material, in which they did nothing about. I'm not some multimillion dollar corporation. They got what they deserved.

As for your first point, I'm aware of that, I'm saying there shouldn't be. Copyright is a civil dispute. If you violate someone else's copyright then they have every right to sue you for everything you've got (although I'm against over-zealous copyright protection exhibited by companies like Disney and such-like). What they should not do is use the criminal justice system to throw you in jail, especially since the Justice system has bigger things to worry about than whether or not a guy distributed DVD Rips of Seinfeld and copyright infringement is, by strict definition, not theft. Prisons are crowded as is.

As for your second point, I sympathise. However, as far as 'deserving' it goes, I don't think that Megaupload should be shut down and the data of millions of legitimate users lost (to a corrupt government who will undoubtedly abuse this data) just because big businesses are afraid that a small minority of people would rather pirate the latest Transformers movie than buy a ticket.

No it not a small minority of people, and it doesn't effect just "big businesses".

http://www.joystiq.com/2013/04/29/game-dev-tycoon-creator-punishes-pirates-with-in-game-bankruptcy/
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2010/08/machinarium-suffers-95-piracy-rate-offers-5-amnesty-sale/
http://2dboy.com/2008/11/13/90/
http://digitalbattle.com/2012/01/31/letter-from-an-indie-pc-developer-regarding-piracy/

 

[FalloutJack]

Huh?

Why would you cite the bombings and call us sore losers? We didn't lose that war! In fact, that was the one where we were actually considered good and decent.

OT: America gets sore at losing, finds mile-high lawsuit on its doorstep for fucking shit up. Justice? Served.

 

[KoudelkaMorgan]

To everyone bemoaning the death of Megaupload, you do know that there are at least like 50 other filehosting networks that are still doing the same stuff right?

Personally I miss Oron more than Megaupload.

But the people with the files you want just post them on different hosts. Personally all you would really need to do to stop a LARGE portion of piracy is to mandate that these filehosting sites REQUIRE you to sign up and provide valid billing info to access their service.

As it is every one of them has free downloads, but make you wait a min for a slow download speed with a pop up or 2. Oh noes! I might have to wait a few more minutes to get my goodies, I better give this shady web site dealing in stolen IPs my credit card info!

I guarantee, you put a pay wall in front of people and enforce it....nothing will happen I was just kidding. You can't stop piracy. The harder you try, the more widely and openly your crap is distributed.

 

[Alar]

Wow... that's... terrible. Think of all the data that might be permanently lost, or at the very least made that much more rare now! It kind of hurts thinking about it. Imagine if you'd backed up some important files, things you'd had for years, only to have them taken away when people were fighting to prove their name so you could have access to it again? Eugh.

 

[Neverhoodian]

Americans are SORE losers...

Very SORE losers

Yeah we really are [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki]

Really? You're using THAT as your example? Really?!

My inner historian is jumping up and down screaming right now.

You do realize the Allies were winning the war handily by then, right? The issue wasn't snatching victory from the jaws of defeat, it was debating whether to use a weapon that could potentially (and did) end the war quickly and save countless lives in the long run.

Go read the projected casualty figures for the proposed conventional invasion of the Japanese home islands. Figures easily run into the millions for most calculations due to the fanatical nature of the hard-line Japanese military leaders. It was projected to be such a bloodbath that nearly 500,000 Purple Hearts were manufactured in anticipation of the invasion. Because of this, there has been no need to make any more Purple Hearts for post-WWII conflicts. Indeed, there are still over 100,000 of them that haven't been awarded yet.

Also, people didn't really know just how horrific of a weapon atomics were at this point. Those in the know were aware of its short term destructive potential, but they only had a vague idea at best of the long term dangers (radiation, cancer, acid rain, birth defects, etc.). This was back in the days when farmers were still using DDT indiscriminately and burying smudge pots in their backyard. The prevailing mindset was "if it doesn't kill me right away, it's harmless."

Back on-topic, this definitely makes me uncomfortable if the claims are true. The dust hasn't even settled yet on the NSA's surveillance program, and now they're pulling this shit?

 

[AngelBlackChaos]

Alot of there stuff they had was illegal and pirated stuff wasn't it? So they can hardly complain stuff was deleted illegally when they allowed people to upload illegal stuff. Funny how criminals break the law to make money, but then quote the law when it suits them.

So if somebody rents a storage locker and puts heroin in it, everyone else with lockers in the same facility should lose all their stuff when he gets busted?

The government didn't erase the stuff, the company did. When the storage company dumps all the lockers after a bust, you have a beef with the storage company, not the Government.

They froze assets from megaupload that many legitimate customers paid for to have their stuff stored there. The government refused to comply with keeping the servers open, or letting assets of the defendant be used to keep it open for investigation...seriously?

I have a friend who still doesn't get to get her gun back that was stolen from her, purely because they are still looking to see if it was used in other crimes. Its been months, there wasn't any reported shootings in the area around that time, but still.

completely reminds me of this.

 

[Symion]

I am one of the victims of Megaupload, I put in several complaints against them not taking down my companies copyright material, in which they did nothing about. I'm not some multimillion dollar corporation. They got what they deserved.

While Megaupload LTD is no group of saints, (as some of their smaller sites like megavideo regularly featured pirated content) supporting this gross abuse of the law that the U.S. Government has perpetrated for the sole purpose of making an example is foolish for any content creator as it lends precedence to policies that hurt numerous strata of content creation (just look at the numerous cases of DMCA take-down abuse on youtube for precedence).

While MU LTD may have: "got what they deserved." in your eyes, I highly doubt that you believe that artists (in the music and video creation field) who used MU as their off-site backup deserved to suddenly have a portion of their livelihood sealed off without regard for their rights as users. I myself have sent clients exclusive content they commissioned over megaupload links (due to their familiarity with the site) and while I now have comprehensive on-site backups of such content there were months where the MU link was the only definitive copy of what they paid for.

As for your note on you being "...one of the victims of Megaupload.": I can tell you from my experiences as being a fairly active enabler of pirates (I used to serve illegal game downloads over high-speed dcc transfers on IRC) and having now shifted into a content creation role in my business that there is a solid core of pirates that have reasons/excuses for pirating that you can reach for the right price and distribution channels (I now spend hundreds of dollars on Steam on a seasonal basis and have purchased copies of every game I've ever pirated as Steam lets me bypass the ridiculous pricing scheme for imported games in my country), one of your links in post #41 even has a company coming to this realization and compromising with such a group to make them consumers instead of pirates, but beyond this there is the outer shell of pirates who never had intention to pay for the content and never shall. Realistically, this second group does not count as a lost sale.

 

[Longstreet]

Funny how some people still think US laws apply everywhere.

Also, for all the piracy screamers in here, ever stop to think that doawnloading might be LEGAL is some countries.

Hell, since last January for every data storage device i buy (smartphone / mp3 player, that sort of stuff) they charge a tax because i might download stuff.

Then if i buy a cd(or online download) i also need to pay tax over that.

Uploading however is illegal

Disclaimer: of course i do not practice piracy nor do i suggest anyone should do it.