Kim Dotcom moves step closer to extradition
Kim Dotcom has made millions but could soon face prison.
The New Zealand Court of Appeal this morning overturned earlier appeal rulings that had sided with Kim Dotcom and his associates. His defence team had previously managed to argue that it was entitled to examine the full set of evidence obtained by U.S. Authorities. This would have given the accused the opportunity to both prepare its defence fully and search for evidence that surveillance and warrants used as part of the group's arrest were illegal. This new ruling, however, dismisses this argument and instead allows US authorities to summarise its evidence.
On passing the ruling Justice Helen Winkelmann stated that an extradition hearing is not a trial in which innocence or guilt is determined, so the procedures required in such a case were not applicable. The court further pointed out that by the rules of the extradition agreement, the US is only obliged to prove it has a prima facie (valid) case.
Kim Dotcom immediately took to Twitter to react to the ruling saying, “Am I disappointed about the ruling today? YES. Do 'good faith' & 'US govt' go together? NO. Will I sleep like an innocent baby tonight? YES.
Kim Dotcom and his co-accused, Mathias Ortmann, Finn Batato and Bram van der Kolk, all face charges pertaining to their running of the file sharing site Megaupload. The site allowed users to upload and share files, with financial incentives for those that did the uploading, and became one of the most prolific sources for illegally shared copyrighted material such as songs and films. However, the group denies the accusations against it on the basis that they didn't control the content of the site.
Kim Dotcom has since launched a new site, Mega, which has removed the financial incentives for uploading.
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Discuss in the forums ReplyNot saying anything he may or may not have done is good or bad, just nice to see someone standing their ground.
haha, the americans would just raid the island, lol
He just needs one without oil, he'll be fine....
Im surprised New Zealand haven't had a visit from the US military yet...
Except, anyone with a bigger gun and a willingness to use it can invade your island and then it's not your island anymore. Only the rule of law can protect you from the rule of force, and when you shrug off the protections of law you become vulnerable to anyone willing to use force. This is why people band together to form civilizations in order to protect themselves from those who would take from them by force.
Also, there's practical considerations with a private island nation beyond simple military defense.
Not the least of which is that you're dependent on other nations for food, fuel, et cetera. This is especially important if you want niceties like electricity and an internet backbone connection for the popular download site you intend to host. i wouldn't put it past someone to blockade computer shipments out of spite.
You mean they would LIBERATE the island using $500bn worth of freedom drones and star spangled bullets.
More importantly, the charges originate from content the US asked him to keep on his servers! So they effectively set him up.
Megaupload was hardly 100% legal either though...
If that's not a reason for someone to be in prison, then I don't know what is.
Megaupload, the site that stored tons of pirated content?
Is that a serious comment or just sarcasm? I'm not sure. If you're serious, then you need to:
1 - Consider all jb0's points.
and
2 - Google the phrase: "Extraordinary Rendition" - The practice or kidnapping people from country 'A', and then taking them to country 'B' so you can torture the cr*p out of them to your heart's content. (Country 'B' obviously not being your own country, where doing said torturing would be deemed highly illegal). That's not mad conspiracy theory by the way, that's a confirmed and unapologetic fact.
Like Cthippo said, the only real protection in life is to either be big enough not be stamped on for fear of serious repercussions, (Russia & China) or friendly enough to not to be stamped on out of a current level of tolerance, (most Western European countries, Canada, Australia & NZ). Pretty much everyone else is fair game.
No offense intended to any American readers, but you know that's how it works these days.
Oh and I meant to say: No they won't.
No-one would deny they've got some serious problems in front of them, (like most of us have) but a total collapse? In three years? There's no such thing as zero chance, but there's as close to a zero chance of that happening as makes no difference.
The argument "Well we're not responsible for what they upload" doesn't wash, the host of the site has the legal obligation to deal with any accusations of copyright infringement, holding your hands up and going "We don't monitor what the users do" doesn't matter, you've got the obligation to sort it, usually by removing the content. If you don't sort it; you're eligible for being sued into the ground, something akin to what's occurring here, this is why so many places have such strictly worded AUPs when it comes to uploading content that isn't your own, if it's not under license and you don't have permission from the original creator for the use; Then it has to be removed. Plain and simple.
I would like to note that these laws only take place in most of Europe and the US. Sweden pretty much allows free redistribution of Copyrighted Content, which is why I'm not ranting and raving about The Pirate Bay, because they're within the laws of the country they're within. Whether it's morally right is another can of worms altogether, one that can be saved for Serious if anyone wants to go there.
I would like to not that the sites aren't under any obligation to do anything about copyrighted content if they aren't made aware of it. This is how such a large portion of Youtube still manages to upload random music videos without having them all removed. (Just putting "I do not own the rights to this song" doesn't actually work.)
If authorities are going to enforce laws, then surely there must be a moral as well as legal obligation for those authorities to operate within those laws themselves? That's a prerequisite, surely? A matter of principal. If authorities are going to duck and weave and bend and break their own laws to enforce them, I think that's a very, very slippery slope we don't want to be heading down.
Don't get me wrong, I think the guy is a complete (*insert rude word*) as he's (allegedly) made tens of millions of pounds off the backs of other peoples efforts and that can't be right - I just don't agree with breaking the law to put him in jail, as I think a strong enough case should've been able to be made against him using legally obtained and open evidence.
How would any of us like to be carted off to a foreign country (which we've never even visited before) on the back of 'evidence' that we're forbidden to even see, let alone defend ourselves against? The thing that upsets me about this isn't really the argument about the morality of internet piracy, I think it's more about the fairness and enforcement of law.
im sorry, im not american, enforce ur laws on ur ppl thx.
Where the offense occurred is debatable in internet crime, though as the vast majority of Megaupload's servers were in the USA(apparently there was one server in France, and the other thirty-six were ALL in Washington, DC), it's rather easy to argue in this case.
Saying someone operating a business in America should not be bound by American laws as far as his business activities in America is concerned seems... questionable.
If he was smart, he would've had his own servers installed in his Hong Kong headquarters. Or leased them somewhere more amenable to copyright violations. Not set them all up in the US capitol.
fair point i missed that part of the situation. then that is a different matter and is bound by their laws in some aspect. i still stand on my point tho in general.
another argument is that internet law is almost nowhere and using existing "land locked" laws are not as compatible and using them is also bending the rules to get some perpetrator.
then there is the project-freeTV kid in the UK that the US also wanted to extradite...
Can, (not will, or should) can I believe the justicesystem of a conutry that Schleps people off to foreign countries to torture them there because it's not legal in their own?
More importantly, can I respect such a country and it's defenders? :(