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Internet MPAA Accused of Hiring Hacker
Michael Hoffman (Blog) - May 26, 2006 5:17 AM

17 comment(s) - last by BladeVenom.. on May 27 at 11:31 PM

Suit filed in the US District Court for the Central District of California accuses MPAA of hiring less than legal consultants

The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), along with the Record Industry Association of America (RIAA), have stepped up their attacks against illegal file sharing in the US. One of the web sites being sued by the MPAA, TorrentSpy, has now filed a countersuit because it claims the MPAA hired a hacker to spy on the internal operations of the web site. Valence Media, the company that operates TorrentSpy, claims that the MPAA offered a hacker $15,000 to gather information on the company.

The hacker reportedly stole a spreadsheet that contains income and expenses for dates ranging from January to June 2005. The hacker turned over information that shows the relationship that he had between the MPAA after being told to gather incriminating information against Valence Media.

Representatives from the MPAA deny the accusations pitted against them by TorrentSpy. The trade group also says this is just a "desperate attempt" at covering the overall idea that the site allegedly facilitates piracy. Some analysts believe if the case does go to court, this example of industrial espionage via paid hacker will be one of the most high-profile tech-related lawsuits in years.

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Pots & Kettles

By vingamm on 5/26/2006 11:38:27 AM , Rating: 2

Oh Ok I see how it is. We get fined, go to jail, and have our equipment conviscated if we DL a single movie, but they can higher "criminals" (as they call them) to infiltrate our organizations steal confidential and personal information and then use it to their advatage against us. Does any one besides me see a double standard here? I hope they freaking get nailed on this! I think bootleggers (people who seel the movies) are lame to, but that does not give them the right to break the law either. I did not have much respect for them to begin with (more than for the RIAA at any cost), but now they are swimming at the bottom too.

RE: Pots & Kettles

By bpurkapi on 5/26/2006 2:09:42 PM , Rating: 2

Double standards are a cold hard fact of life... Riaa has lots of money to work with and pursue a strategy of targeting a single individual at a time, essentially David v. Goliath. We all know that David v. Goliath was a myth so in the real world Goliath wins. The only way that Goliath doesn't win is if 500 Davids get together and kick his a**. This means what needs to happen is a class action lawsuit with the likes of Torrentspy and a bunch of other people accussed against these criminals.

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