Administrators of French File Sharing Site Arrested, Face Jail and Fines
Administrators of French File Sharing Site Arrested, Face Jail and Fines
Posted 05/30/2011 at 1:41pm
| by Ryan Whitwam
7
Comments
Print
The administrators of one of France’s most popular file sharing sites, “Liberty Land” have been arrested, TorrentFreak is reporting. The French trio are facing charges of organised counterfeiting, which could net them up to 5 years in jail and $700,000 in fines. The site is, as you might expect, down.
Liberty Land was one of many sites hosted in Canada where copyright law is unusually friendly. The site did not host any content, but did provide links to pirated music, movies, and TV shows on sites like MegaUpload and RapidShare. Despite the questionable legality of simply linking to content, French content owner groups SACEM and ALPA filed complaints against the sites.
After a long and complicated investigation, French authorities managed to identify the owners of Liberty Land and make the arrest. The severity of the charges stems from the fact that the site operators are alleged to have pulled in about $285,300 in advertising revenue. They have been released pending trial. Do you think sites like Liberty Land should be targeted?
More like this
7
Comments
Comments are closed on this article
bling581
May 31, 2011 at 10:24am
I think this is pretty bad. Can you really expect people who put links to other sites to know if any of them are breaking copyright laws? Even if they would comb through each website how do they know if each piece of content is compliant or not? They may have a case if they can prove that the website knew that the links hosted illegal material. If not then they're innocent in my opinion.
Instead of tracking down the real criminals it seems like they're going for easy money by picking on these guys.
TommM
May 31, 2011 at 12:38am
"They were just linking people to sites that offer media for free."
Uh no..they were linking people to sites of media for people to STEAL. Big difference...
Holly Golightly
May 31, 2011 at 1:15am
Umm... Shouldn't the justice department target websites that are ACTUALLY giving the people media to "steal" as you have suggested? I think it would be better if they went straight to the source... Also, a lot of people use Google to link them to pirated goods as well... Shouldn't the justice department seek ALL who link people to STEAL media? I find it ironic they would go after these small guys, and not get the guys who may be actually cause the greatest damage. To me, it seems rather counter-productive with their time and the cost of litigation. It kind of reminds me what happened to Napster... People easily found other replacements. One day it is LimeWire, the next it is PirateBay. The media lobbiest are behind the times.
Holly Golightly
May 30, 2011 at 10:08pm
Wow, what a primative way to fight "piracy!" To be honest with you, the media industry should not price themselves out of the market. Websites like Liberty-Land should not be targeted. They-themselves did not post any content at all. They were just linking people to sites that offer media for free. They are not hosting it themselves, so I do not know what to say. If anything, they should be protected.
Ghok
May 30, 2011 at 5:13pm
Honestly don't care if they're going after the people who profit off file sharing.
That said, I do think it's a paper tiger that everyone is way too concerned over. I mean, at $700,000 you'd think this was something serious. But links to download TV shows? I'd put that up as about as evil as jay walking.
Joji
May 30, 2011 at 3:36pm
Law is just... gay in many terms. They are friggin links. What's the big idea!
Connect with MaximumPC
Featured Content
The gang discusses the GTX 690, Trinity, Ivy Bridge, Amazon, big-box stores, MMOs,...
This month's issue
Feature
Build a PC On Any Budget
Feature
Cloud Services Showdown
How-To
Encrypt Your External Drive
Build It
Upgrade an X58 Rig
Most Commented Articles
Latest Max PC Tweets
- maximumpc: Original RickRoll Video Returns to YouTube After 24-Hour Copyright Hiatus http://t.co/MaH9Sxyy10 hours 33 min ago
- maximumpc: Corsair has decided not to go forward with its $78 million IPO, citing weak equity market conditions http://t.co/A5a4DAzj10 hours 42 min ago
- maximumpc: Want to work at Maximum PC? Our Online Managing Editor, Alex, is moving away, so we need a new one. http://t.co/9Z7JCh0E2 days 8 hours ago
