Kim Dotcom speaks out on secret anti-piracy report to RT

Published: 25 July, 2012, 23:34
Edited: 26 July, 2012, 06:01

A major music industry organization’s anti-piracy report has been leaked to the Web, and its content suggests that charges waged at Megaupload have been exaggerated by its critics. In an exclusive interview with RT, Kim Dotcom weighs in.

An international copyright case targeting Megaupload.com and its founder, Kim Dotcom, have made both the website and the man behind the operation not just enemies of the FBI and music industry but also household names this year. The January arrest of Dotcom, the concurrent raid of his New Zealand mansion and the seizure of his immensely popular file locker site made headlines around the globe, but more than six months later the FBI and the entertainment industry trade groups spearheading what some call a witch-hunt have been burdened with continuous roadblocks. In turn the case has spawned relentless rumors that their argument against Mega has been killed before it could ever be brought to trial.

A new report just leaked to the Web suggests that Megaupload was actually among the more law-compliant of the major sites that allegedly facilitated piracy, bringing yet another minor victory to Dotcom and his associates as they try to dismiss allegations of copyright infringement.

A memo penned for the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) by Mo Ali, the organization’s chief-anti piracy officer, has been unearthed by reporters at the website TorrentFreak. On Thursday the website published excerpts of the document meant to be for internal use only, and the material included in the report decimates the piracy allegations that Megaupload has repeatedly dismissed.

In their analysis, the IFPI writes that the entertainment industry is threatened by two facets: computer users who share files from one machine to another; and servers that host content to be downloaded across the globe. Megaupload is included in the latter category as a cyberlocker, and has been repeatedly documented as at one time one of the world’s most popular websites. Even though the files being both hosted on and downloaded to Mega’s servers made up the majority of filelocker traffic, the IFPI says that Dotcom’s company largely abided by the safe harbor provision of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, which allows websites found to host illegal content to avoid prosecution if they remove illicit filesl upon demand of the copyright holder.

FULL STORY: http://rt.com/usa/news/kim-dotcom-piracy-report-056/