US Govt Relies on MPAA For Advice on Domain Seizures

The seizure of 82 domain names by the US government in November as part of Operation In Our Sites v. 2.0 that were claimed to be used for commercial websites engaged in the illegal sale and distribution of counterfeit goods and copyrighted works has become a subject of controversy.No warning was given of the government seizures and several of the website operators have claimed to be innocent and have subsequently criticised the investigation for misrepresenting how their sites operated.Not all of the websites associated with the domain names seized are happy being associated with illegal file sharing, although the claims from law enforcement are that even providing links to file sharing sites that are involved in copyright violations is reason enough to having the domain names seized.The story has been covered by the New York Times who reports that “after being shown the affidavit, the operator of dajaz1.com – a widely read hip-hop blog that posts new songs and videos – disputed many of the warrant’s examples of what it called copyright infringement. He said that, like much of the material on his site, the songs had been sent to him for promotional purposes by record labels and the artists.”The operator who would only be identified by the name “Splash” was able to show the Times emails “from record label employees and third-party marketers offering songs mentioned in the affidavit.”It appears the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) relied heavily on the Motion Picture Association of America for much of their information that led to the seizures.According to PC World, “ICE assistant deputy director Erik Barnett said soon after the seizures, admitting that they basically just took what sites Hollywood said were a problem and seized them.”