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Community => Politics and Government => Topic started by: CaseAgainstFaith on January 23, 2012, 04:15:31 pm

Title: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: CaseAgainstFaith on January 23, 2012, 04:15:31 pm
Spanish privacy attorney Carlos Snchez Almeida, who's based in Barcelona, said the takedown may have violated people's privacy rights under Spanish law. Accordingly, he's threatened to file suit over the Megaupload takedown. On his Jaque Perpetuo blog, Almeida wrote Friday that "Spanish citizens who had accounts in Megaupload should collect as much information about the files that they had hosted, for the purposes of a possible claim" against the U.S. government. In particular, the U.S. government's actions may conflict with Spanish data-access and privacy laws, especially if U.S. authorities begin accessing data that was stored by Megaupload.

source - http://informationweek.com/news/security/client/232500305 (http://informationweek.com/news/security/client/232500305)

I bet the Feds didn't take this into account when they did this.  I wonder should Spain actually file a lawsuit, will other countries join them?
This might of just opened up a giant can of worms that won't end well for the US once everything is said and done.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Shane for Wax on January 23, 2012, 04:21:24 pm
Last time there was a multi-national takedown people got mad and it violated laws. I didn't expect it would happen again. Interesting development.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Star Cluster on January 23, 2012, 05:36:19 pm
See, this is another aspect of what I was talking about in the other thread.  When the US government starts going after people all around the globe, it becomes an enormous cluster fuck.  This thing is going to get nastier and nastier the further they get into it because not every country has the same laws the US does.  Nor are they all going to be willing to participate with or even co-operate with the US government in dealing with this if it is in opposition to their own laws. 
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Sigmaleph on January 23, 2012, 05:43:30 pm
Sánchez Almeida is saying Spanish citizens (who had something stored in Megaupload) might be able to sue, not Spain itself.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: ironbite on January 23, 2012, 06:30:01 pm
OH SNAP!

Ironbite-bet they didn't see this coming.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: TheL on January 23, 2012, 09:25:30 pm
Sánchez Almeida is saying Spanish citizens (who had something stored in Megaupload) might be able to sue, not Spain itself.

Damn.  If the actual nation sued, they'd have a chance of stopping this madness.

The individuals in question don't have deep enough pockets to win in court, and would stand to lose quite a lot even in an out-of-court settlement.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: DasFuchs on January 23, 2012, 11:43:40 pm
GOOD

I'm glad someone in this, especially a country, has the balls to stand up and bitch slap the US government for overstepping bullshit
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: VirtualStranger on January 24, 2012, 12:22:52 am
IN RELATED NEWS (http://torrentfreak.com/us-threatened-to-blacklist-spain-for-not-implementing-site-blocking-law-120105/)

Quote
In a leaked letter sent to Spain’s outgoing President, the US ambassador to the country warned that as punishment for not passing a SOPA-style file-sharing site blocking law, Spain risked being put on a United States trade blacklist . Inclusion would have left Spain open to a range of “retaliatory options” but already the US was working with the incoming government to reach its goals.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: DasFuchs on January 24, 2012, 03:30:58 am
IN RELATED NEWS (http://torrentfreak.com/us-threatened-to-blacklist-spain-for-not-implementing-site-blocking-law-120105/)

Quote
In a leaked letter sent to Spain’s outgoing President, the US ambassador to the country warned that as punishment for not passing a SOPA-style file-sharing site blocking law, Spain risked being put on a United States trade blacklist . Inclusion would have left Spain open to a range of “retaliatory options” but already the US was working with the incoming government to reach its goals.

Someone needs to send a truckload of chill pills to the Feds
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Art Vandelay on January 24, 2012, 05:47:05 am
Doesn't sound to me like Spain actually has a case here. The laws violated were Spanish laws, not international. Megaupload is not a Spanish site, nor is it owned by Spanish citizen(s). In my (rather limited, admittedly) knowledge of law, it just looks more like a "fuck you, you dickhead" from the Spaniards than a serious legal challenge.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Witchyjoshy on January 24, 2012, 01:10:22 pm
MegaUpload may not be Spanish, but its takedown affected Spanish citizens adversely, not just in a "denied service" sense, but in a "stolen information" sense.  Imagine if there was a global bank, and the USA shut it down... and in doing so, denied citizens in other countries the money they had stored in that bank.

And now the the USA is threatening Spain...

It really is true.  The United States of America is the country equivalent of a bully.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Osama bin Bambi on January 24, 2012, 07:06:17 pm
MegaUpload isn't Spanish or American. It was started by a musical artist from Hong Kong. America had no business taking it down to begin with, seeing as the owners 1) aren't American citizens and 2) were not consciously complicit in any piracy that occurred. If a guy owns a club where people get away with distributing drugs without his knowledge, do you arrest the club owner?
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Meshakhad on January 24, 2012, 07:34:52 pm
MegaUpload isn't Spanish or American. It was started by a musical artist from Hong Kong. America had no business taking it down to begin with, seeing as the owners 1) aren't American citizens and 2) were not consciously complicit in any piracy that occurred. If a guy owns a club where people get away with distributing drugs without his knowledge, do you arrest the club owner?

Their claim is that the owners WERE complicit.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: starseeker on January 24, 2012, 07:57:34 pm
MegaUpload isn't Spanish or American. It was started by a musical artist from Hong Kong. America had no business taking it down to begin with, seeing as the owners 1) aren't American citizens and 2) were not consciously complicit in any piracy that occurred. If a guy owns a club where people get away with distributing drugs without his knowledge, do you arrest the club owner?

Their claim is that the owners WERE complicit.

And there's some very incriminating internal e-mails saying they were.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Jack Mann on January 24, 2012, 08:15:19 pm
And it was an international effort, involving law enforcement from numerous jurisdictions including Hong Kong.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Sigmaleph on January 24, 2012, 09:31:13 pm
MegaUpload isn't Spanish or American. It was started by a musical artist from Hong Kong. America had no business taking it down to begin with, seeing as the owners 1) aren't American citizens and 2) were not consciously complicit in any piracy that occurred. If a guy owns a club where people get away with distributing drugs without his knowledge, do you arrest the club owner?
You don't need to be an American citizen for American law enforcement to take action against you. And Megaupload had servers in America, meaning they had jurisdiction.
Besides, it's ridiculous to say that the owners of Megaupload didn't know there was piracy going on. Any moderately internet-savvy person knew it, how could they not? At best, they could argue that they had a policy of removing any files they knew to be in violation of copyright. And even that appears to be very unlikely.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Osama bin Bambi on January 24, 2012, 09:48:32 pm
My bad
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Art Vandelay on January 24, 2012, 10:09:57 pm
MegaUpload may not be Spanish, but its takedown affected Spanish citizens adversely, not just in a "denied service" sense, but in a "stolen information" sense.  Imagine if there was a global bank, and the USA shut it down... and in doing so, denied citizens in other countries the money they had stored in that bank.

And now the the USA is threatening Spain...

It really is true.  The United States of America is the country equivalent of a bully.

I'm not saying the US government isn't a bully, I'm saying legally, I don't see this ever being a serious case. Like I said, the only laws violated (or at least, the laws which this potential lawsuit is based on) were Spanish. They're not valid in international or American courts so they they can't be used to sue the US government.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Witchyjoshy on January 24, 2012, 10:51:20 pm
MegaUpload may not be Spanish, but its takedown affected Spanish citizens adversely, not just in a "denied service" sense, but in a "stolen information" sense.  Imagine if there was a global bank, and the USA shut it down... and in doing so, denied citizens in other countries the money they had stored in that bank.

And now the the USA is threatening Spain...

It really is true.  The United States of America is the country equivalent of a bully.

I'm not saying the US government isn't a bully, I'm saying legally, I don't see this ever being a serious case. Like I said, the only laws violated (or at least, the laws which this potential lawsuit is based on) were Spanish. They're not valid in international or American courts so they they can't be used to sue the US government.

And I'm not saying this is a serious case, I'm only saying it should be a serious case.

Taking Megaupload down like that essentially resulted in the denial of much legal software to people who were not taking part in illegal activities.  Material which is probably in the hands of the USA right now.

In a sense, it's more like theft than piracy actually is.

Really getting sick of this country.
Title: Re: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: CaseAgainstFaith on January 27, 2012, 09:12:23 am
Update Look at the funny can of worms this FBI just opened up

In most reports following the MegaUpload shutdown, the site is exclusively portrayed as a piracy haven.

However, hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of people used the site to share research data, work documents, personal video collections.

As of today, these people are still unsure whether they will ever get their personal belongings back.

In a response, Pirate Parties worldwide have started to make a list of all the people affected by the raids, and they are planning to file an official complaint against the US authorities.

“This initiative is a starting point for legitimate internet users to help defend themselves from the legal abuses promoted by those wishing to aggressively lock away cultural materials for their own financial gain.”

Legal experts and citizen rights groups have taken an interest in the issue as well, TorrentFreak learned. The Pirate Parties are the first to make an inventory of the damage, but not the last.

source - http://torrentfreak.com/megaupload-users-plan-to-sue-the-fbi-over-lost-files-120126/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TorrentfreakBits+%28TorrentFreak+-+Bits%29&utm_content=Google+Reader (http://torrentfreak.com/megaupload-users-plan-to-sue-the-fbi-over-lost-files-120126/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TorrentfreakBits+%28TorrentFreak+-+Bits%29&utm_content=Google+Reader)

Good to see more people wanting to sue the FBI after this MegaUpload's scandal I hope they actually do learn a lesson from this. They probably won't but here is to hoping anyway.
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Witchyjoshy on January 27, 2012, 03:07:20 pm
Oh look, the pirates are more concerned about people's property than the government is.

What does this say again?
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: m52nickerson on January 27, 2012, 03:16:18 pm
"It is important to note that Mega clearly warned users to keep copies of any files they uploaded," the DOJ spokesman said. "Megaupload.com expressly informed users through its Frequently Asked Questions ('FAQs') and its Terms of Service that users have no proprietary interest in any of the files on Megaupload's servers, they assume the full risk of complete loss or unavailability of their data, and that Megaupload can terminate site operations without prior notice."

from - http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2399162,00.asp (http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2399162,00.asp)

People who did not keep copies of their stuff maybe S.O.L.
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: CaseAgainstFaith on January 27, 2012, 03:56:38 pm
"It is important to note that Mega clearly warned users to keep copies of any files they uploaded," the DOJ spokesman said. "Megaupload.com expressly informed users through its Frequently Asked Questions ('FAQs') and its Terms of Service that users have no proprietary interest in any of the files on Megaupload's servers, they assume the full risk of complete loss or unavailability of their data, and that Megaupload can terminate site operations without prior notice."

from - http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2399162,00.asp (http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2399162,00.asp)

People who did not keep copies of their stuff maybe S.O.L.

But does that really hold up in the court of law considering the reason for their full loss was because of the FBI's meddling and forceful shutdown of the Megaupload vs say Megaupload having a server go down and not being able to recover the hard drive data?
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: m52nickerson on January 27, 2012, 04:01:09 pm
"It is important to note that Mega clearly warned users to keep copies of any files they uploaded," the DOJ spokesman said. "Megaupload.com expressly informed users through its Frequently Asked Questions ('FAQs') and its Terms of Service that users have no proprietary interest in any of the files on Megaupload's servers, they assume the full risk of complete loss or unavailability of their data, and that Megaupload can terminate site operations without prior notice."

from - http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2399162,00.asp (http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2399162,00.asp)

It will all depend on how the actual terms of service were worded.  I think "no proprietary interest" and "assume full risk"  might hold up very well.

People who did not keep copies of their stuff maybe S.O.L.

But does that really hold up in the court of law considering the reason for their full loss was because of the FBI's meddling and forceful shutdown of the Megaupload vs say Megaupload having a server go down and not being able to recover the hard drive data?
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: CaseAgainstFaith on January 27, 2012, 04:09:23 pm
"It is important to note that Mega clearly warned users to keep copies of any files they uploaded," the DOJ spokesman said. "Megaupload.com expressly informed users through its Frequently Asked Questions ('FAQs') and its Terms of Service that users have no proprietary interest in any of the files on Megaupload's servers, they assume the full risk of complete loss or unavailability of their data, and that Megaupload can terminate site operations without prior notice."

from - http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2399162,00.asp (http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2399162,00.asp)

It will all depend on how the actual terms of service were worded.  I think "no proprietary interest" and "assume full risk"  might hold up very well.

People who did not keep copies of their stuff maybe S.O.L.

But does that really hold up in the court of law considering the reason for their full loss was because of the FBI's meddling and forceful shutdown of the Megaupload vs say Megaupload having a server go down and not being able to recover the hard drive data?

I guess what I am trying to get a cross is this - Yes in the ToS and FAQ it may state that, but is that not just legal speak to try and cover their own ass (MegaUpload)?  Thus you might not be able to sue MegaUpload should you lose something and they can't recover it or they just disappear off the internet however how does that cover the asses of not being able to sue the FBI who caused the shutdown and the loss of property?  I mean it isn't like they are trying to hold MegaUpload responsible and sue them, they are going and trying to sue the FBI which caused this mess.
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: m52nickerson on January 27, 2012, 04:18:37 pm
I guess what I am trying to get a cross is this - Yes in the ToS and FAQ it may state that, but is that not just legal speak to try and cover their own ass (MegaUpload)?  Thus you might not be able to sue MegaUpload should you lose something and they can't recover it or they just disappear off the internet however how does that cover the asses of not being able to sue the FBI who caused the shutdown and the loss of property?  I mean it isn't like they are trying to hold MegaUpload responsible and sue them, they are going and trying to sue the FBI which caused this mess.

Maybe, but it could be argued the MegaUpload forced the government to shut them down because they were knowingly breaking the law.  I don't know enough about those parts of the law.  I do have a feeling that those people who had files on those servers will not have any legal recourse to get them back.
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Neith on January 29, 2012, 12:34:30 am
I was against the seizure of the poker sites, and think Americans should be able to play poker for money online. They won't exactly stop us from spending $1000 on lotto tickets in one shot, so what's the difference?

I am vehemently opposed to SOPA and PIPA, because of the way those bills are written.

Megaupload is a bit different.

Computing 101: Always, always, always keep at least one backup of anything you don't want to lose. I feel bad for the people who lost their legal content, and I hope they get it back, but so many people were using Megaupload because they made it so easy to share pirated material, and I really don't think they tried to police it at all.

I do question whether the FBI had the legal right to bring the whole site down.  Shouldn't their right only extend to shutting down the servers that are in the US, and block US users from accessing the site? Not that people couldn't use proxies...
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Witchyjoshy on January 29, 2012, 02:20:03 am
Being aware that your site is a haven for pirating doesn't mean that doing anything about it is inherently easy.

I mean, look at Youtube.  For every video that they pull down for using a song, there's 20 others that use that song.  And it's generally a long time before anything is done about those.

The majority of people using MegaUpload were most likely using it for genuine material.  The pirates rarely are the majority of anything.  (Unless you count people who have stereos that can be heard through the walls or who play their music audibly in public as "pirates", in which case, wtf.)

Now, consider how many users used the site.  And how many were running the site.  It isn't easy to sift through millions of files.

They had a report abuse function, and I don't remember reading that they failed to act on it (generally because successful policing is generally not reported because it's supposed to be the norm)
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Shadowmind on January 29, 2012, 03:16:29 am
One of the issue the that was brought up was the MegaUpload only removed the link and not the actual file if there multiple links to the file.
But, MegaUpload could argue that while the take down notice meant that the single individual was not authorized, it doesn't mean that all users that uploaded that file were not authorized.
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Vene on January 29, 2012, 09:45:43 am
They had a report abuse function, and I don't remember reading that they failed to act on it (generally because successful policing is generally not reported because it's supposed to be the norm)
This was posted in the other Megaupload thread.
Megaupload employees apparently knew how the site was being used. When making payments through its “uploader rewards” program, employees sometimes looked through the material in those accounts first. "10+ Full popular DVD rips (split files), a few small porn movies, some software with keygenerators (warez)," said one of these notes. (The DMCA does not provide a "safe harbor" to sites who have actual knowledge of infringing material and do nothing about it.)

In a 2008 chat, one employee noted that "we have a funny business... modern days [sic] pirates :)," to which the reply was, "we're not pirates, we're just providing shipping servies [sic] to pirates :)."

Employees send each other e-mails saying things like, “can u pls get me some links to the series called ‘Seinfeld’ from MU [Megaupload]," since some employees did have access to a private internal search engine.

Employees even allegedly uploaded content themselves, such as a BBC Earth episode uploaded in 2008.

Other messages appear to indicate that employees knew how important copyrighted content was to their business. Content owners had a specific number of takedown requests they could make each day; in 2009, for instance, Time Warner was allowed to use the abuse tool to remove 2,500 links per day. When the company requested an increase, one employee suggested that "we can afford to be cooperative at current growth levels"— implying that if growth had not been so robust, takedowns should be limited. Kim Dotcom approved an increase to 5,000 takedowns a day.

Employees also had access to analytics. One report showed that a specific linking site had “produce[d] 164,214 visits to Megaupload for a download of the copyrighted CD/DVD burning software package Nero Suite 10. The software package had the suggested retail price of $99.” The government's conclusion: Megaupload knew what was happening and did little to stop it.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/01/why-the-feds-smashed-megaupload.ars (http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/01/why-the-feds-smashed-megaupload.ars)

I also have a sincere question for the people concerned about the loss of personal data. What was the government supposed to do? Were they supposed to give a time period where people could redownload their files (including the stolen ones)? Were they supposed to sort through them one by one to determine if they were legit or not? I'm genuinely curious as to how you think the logistics should be handled in this case where there are millions of pieces of data to sort through.
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Witchyjoshy on January 29, 2012, 06:26:15 pm
Apparently, joking and making humorous remarks about something that you know you can't stop means that you're automatically in league with them.  Because, you know, that's totally how society works.

Now, I'm not saying they weren't in league with the pirates... but that there isn't enough proof other than a lot of "allegedly" and something about the abuse tool being limited (Which I would think would be standard practice, in order to prevent the abuse tool from being abused, naturally) and a whole shit ton of he said she said bull shit.

There is not nearly enough evidence for this bullshit.  It's fishy as hell.

Someone else put it best - they should have, at most, seized the US servers and then prevented US access to MegaUpload.  At least it would've been easier to settle an intracountry dispute than an intercountry dispute.
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Shane for Wax on January 30, 2012, 08:19:52 am
Here is the importance of backups (http://venturebeat.com/2012/01/30/feds-says-megaupload-data-could-be-deleted-by-thursday/). Good to know they can destroy evidence.

Quote
The FBI copied some data during its seizure, but left the bulk untouched. The government, after seizing MegaUpload’s assets, hasn’t stepped forward yet to assume the costs of keeping this data while the trail moves forward. It’s a reminder that criminal investigations haven’t caught up with the reality of today’s data centers. Remember that in June of last year, the FBI knocked dozens of innocent sites offline when it seized servers at a hosting facility in Reston, VA. Perhaps the big takeaway is that when it comes to policing the criminal use of data, there is a good chance of collateral damage.
Title: Re: Updated: Spain looking at possibly sueing US Govt over MegaUpload takedown
Post by: Witchyjoshy on January 31, 2012, 05:23:19 am
http://www.dewatv.com/2012/01/megaupload-owner-50-years-prison-kim.html

Quote
Dotcom, born Kim Schmitz, was arrested Friday at his luxurious mansion in Auckland, New Zealand. Dotcom and other Megaupload executives were charged with racketeering, money laundering, copyright infringement and more. If convicted, they could face up to 50 years in prison.
During the bail hearing on Monday, prosecutor Anne Toohey requested no bail as she believed Dotcom posed a flight risk.

Well this is infuriating.