BlueAndroid

This must depend on jurisdiction, but in most western legal systems it's called "Possession of Child Exploitation/Abuse etc Material". Some material that might strictly fit into the age category is not CEM due to some other merit, especially when borderline- ie is art. We have case law for that where I live. 2ndly "possession" is formed by 2 elements- knowledge and control. Can't have it without them. Now you may live somewhere with different law, but this is pretty standard.

I've never done a copyright case in my life and intend to keep it that way but Mega had a rewards program where you got money for uploading content that people downloaded. A bounty program for fresh, new, just-released-at-the-box-office movies. Let's not rose tint the past. They had internal emails discussing how to get more movies closer to the release dates. It was pretty blatant. The compliance with take-down didn't even remove things from the server, just the link the copyright owner noticed..

Maybe I should call the copyright owner something else that fits HN, induces more sympathy... Intellectual Property Doyen? Post Marketing Profit Retrieval Specialist? VP of Marketshare and Ongoing Growth? Capital Return Scout? Nah can't keep a straight face, "Dude with the Creatives on a leash"

I know the intention was not to go for CEM. If it was they wouldn't have told anyone, they would have just snaffled the servers and brought the hammer down on the admin and slurped IP/user details for a couple of days. For examples see darknet sites that have been put in the hands of law enforcement recently.

Yeh, they should sort the business model. I'm not in favor of actions that perpetuate ignoring the rule of law. If a rule is bad, change it, don't just ignore it being broken. It breeds corruption on both sides. See prostitution and most forms of prohibition

Think about it this way- would you prefer street racers did their thing and broke laws (yes I have a bit of OCD like a lot of folks in tech- mine includes the Criminal Code) in public where the law is..flouted.. or had to go out of their way, to somewhere only those who want to engage in that activity go.

The biggest issue I see is that legitimate tools for protest are being subverted, perhaps by a majority, based on traffic analysis of TOR by Standford.

The depressing reality is that I'm confronting the reality of the hands on abuse on a day to day basis. That's my world. If your's doesn't have that, lucky you. I don't feel good about it in the slightest. But thanks for letting me vent that :) I'm not sure why free speech IS file sharing in your argument. Maybe freedom of intellectual property? You're also making assumptions about the law I operate under. I'm not in the US or NZ. So I couldn't have any impact on the mega situation. I too am amazed by the extra-territorial nature of the proceedings. I think it's bad law. I mean, WETA is in NZ, some of their movies would have been on mega, it could have been done by New Zealand police and courts. Why not?

I am occasionally regaled by tales from investigators I have assisted with descriptions of jail sentences handed down to abusers- you would think that would be satisfying. It's not. It's just confirmation by jury and society that they were in fact evil human beings and in a couple of years they'll be back. And that's grim.

I wish people were more considered, less cavalier, when providing services. You obviously thought about it. That's important and some people appreciate it. I don't buy the "I just do X, what happens next is not my fault". It doesn't wash in commerce, it's equally invalid in ethics.

The aim isn't just prosecution, deterrence and reducing ease of use is an aim. And self selecting by choosing a service that only hosts CP makes it like shooting fish in a barrel when you do roll the admin/server. Ask "freedom hosting" and some Tormail folks about that. I was actually really surprised at the time to see the site that hosted my favorite OCR tech pdfs- yes, mega, was pretty obviously allowing forums to flourish under it's nose. Maybe there was too much content for them to check or maybe they didn't care. Yes, the investigator's job get's harder but not having this material turn up in effectively mainstream environments is a good thing. I'm technical rather than investigative but good investigation + sloppy OpSec breaks the veil of anonymity, technical brilliance rarely does. Those barriers you are thinking of- they have always existed in meatspace. Digital space is a cornucopia of evidence in comparison.

I work in Law Enforcement, so feel to disregard my opinion as biased , however, 75% of my work relates to child exploitation material, and an enormous amount of child abuse material disappeared from easy access when mega-upload went down. I used to find computers with lists and lists of megaupload urls. When that method died out a little beacon of happy shone for me. Now I understand that free movies trumps removing abusive material, and as rapidshare and others took a more reasoned approach the child abuse material slipped into TOR and then i2p (after we brought the house down repeatedly on lolitacity and similar places in TOR). So it was more of a temporary reprieve. But those still at it have to work a bit harder and I'm happy about that. It's all about the free movies right? Well if that's your world, you're lucky.