For some, Kim Dotcom, the founder of the notorious file-sharing site 'MegaUpload,' is a criminal and internet pirate; for others, he is an unyielding advocate for personal privacy. On March 12, 2017, the world premiere of a documentary film took place, featuring interviews with politicians, journalists, and musicians who know Kim 'from all angles.' New Zealand director Annie Goldson uses personal archive footage to convey the essence of Dotcom's legal battles with the U.S. government and other entities that declared war on global internet piracy.
In his youth, Kim Dotcom considered the U.S. to be the bastion of global democracy, a country whose government selflessly fights for the triumph of justice around the world. Having played the roles of hacker, juvenile delinquent, and computer security consultant, by the age of 30, Kim decided to start a business and created the largest file-sharing service 'MegaUpload,' which reached 160 million users. Even up until its closure in 2012, it was ranked 13th among the most visited internet resources. During its 7 years of operation, 'MegaUpload' earned Kim over a hundred million dollars, but as a result of legal disputes, he became bankrupt. The initiators of the prosecution were the U.S., accusing Dotcom of hosting pirated content and violating copyright, which allegedly caused rights holders damages amounting to 500 million dollars.
To this day, Kim has not managed to recover from the blow and improve his financial situation, as he spends all his resources on legal fees and creating new innovative projects, such as the platform 'K.im' — a so-called 'file store' that processes payments based on cryptocurrency.
The article discusses the plot of the film 'Caught in the Net,' as well as excerpts from other journalistic materials that are unavailable to Russian-speaking readers.
"It was amazing!"
In September 2011, Kim gifted Auckland a 10-minute fireworks display, spending over $500,000. He personally filmed this spectacular show from a helicopter, where he was with his wife, and posted a clip with the most colorful effects on his YouTube channel. The nighttime show was dedicated to celebrating his residency approval in New Zealand, and it was the most grandiose fireworks display in the country's history.
It was just 4 months until Dotcom's arrest. The detention and questioning were brief, but it took a significant toll on Kim's nerves—the situation was exacerbated by the discovery of illegal weapons.
A police special unit member recounted that Dotcom was taken from a locked security room with a loaded shotgun in hand. The arrest fortunately happened without a shootout, but the presence of unregistered firearms in the house hindered Kim from posting bail immediately.
The show must go on
In February 2012, less than a month after his arrest, Dotcom was released, and the searches of his home were deemed illegal. Thanks to his lawyers, he managed to recover some of his assets from seizure and sold nine of his cars to pay those same lawyers. This victory over the justice system meant a great deal, but overall, the situation in New Zealand was favorable for him, likely because the government didn't want to 'bend' to the FBI. Moreover, the Prime Minister felt guilty for the clumsy work of the intelligence agency, which Dotcom detected in the very first month of his stay in New Zealand. When this was revealed, she had to publicly apologize to Kim, partly due to pressure from the local opposition and journalists.
Dotcom was not going to accept the shutdown of his business. By August 2012, he promised to launch a new, improved, and completely legal service. This legality would be ensured by encrypting all materials uploaded onto it 'at military grade.' Each user would receive a key without which it would be impossible to access the uploaded materials. Thus, even if the police seized the server, determining what was stored on it would be impossible.
Virtuous piracy
It's unclear whether Dotcom foresaw what MegaUpload could become, but users certainly did. When they discovered the latest Hollywood releases on the website, the file-sharing service exploded in popularity. People would simply Google the movie they wanted to watch or the song they wanted to hear, and a link to the file would appear right at the top of the search results. They clicked the link and arrived at MegaUpload, where they saw a message: 'By the way, if you want to download the file faster, just pay!' They paid to get a premium account for faster downloads. Everything was cleverly designed to attract users who weren't thinking about whether it was legal or not. They just wanted to watch a movie and honestly paid for it, while the money went to Kim's company.
However, they were formally not paying for the movie, but for the speed! No one forced them to pay for downloading files.
MegaUpload was the go-to place for students at the University of Kansas looking for free movies. When tech reporter Greg Sandoval saw his girlfriend watching a newly released film 'Mad Man' on her computer, he asked where she had downloaded it from. The former college graduate replied: 'From the site our 63-year-old professor showed me!' Greg thought this was serious because the site's owners were effectively streaming pirated movies. 'It's so easy, and if they made it this simple, that technology could really go mainstream!'
Kim and Mona
Kim recalls traveling extensively across Asia. When he was at a nightclub in the Philippines, he saw Mona dancing and immediately took notice. She was incredibly beautiful, and since Dotcom described himself as 'a bit shy,' he asked his assistant to approach Mona and invite her to join their group.
Mona says she noticed a guy sitting alone in the corner and thought, why wasn't anyone talking to him? As it turned out, they had a lot in common, including a tough childhood, but they remained just friends for a long time.
Kim shares: "I knew I wanted to be with her! Look at me, I'm definitely no supermodel. So I need to put in more time and effort if I want someone to fall in love with me." He took Mona to Europe, showed her Paris, and "eventually, she fell in love with me! We were very happy together."
In 2009, they vacationed in New Zealand and were simply enchanted by the place. While traveling through the lush green hills of New Zealand, they reached Coatsville and saw a house they instantly fell in love with.
By that time, MegaUpload was extremely successful, earning Kim tens of millions of dollars a year. In New Zealand, almost nothing was known about Dotcom – to the neighbors, he was a reclusive wealthy foreigner living in the largest house in the area.
Dotcom gradually became more involved in New Zealand's public life and gained some notoriety only through the grand Auckland fireworks. After learning that Dotcom had obtained residency in New Zealand, Chris Dodd, head of the American Motion Picture Association, stated in January 2012: "Now these thieves, these brazen pirates are emigrating offshore, where the jurisdiction of U.S. courts does not apply. Therefore, we need to develop a mechanism to protect our jobs and property and shut down all these websites or search engines that facilitate illegal foreign file sharing!"
Kim had a plan to register MegaUpload and take the company public. By his estimates, his project was worth $2 billion. For him, this would mark a transition to a completely new level of business – a legal level.
Kim remembered how in 2010 they were planning to launch several new websites, one of which was MegaMoovie. It was intended to compete with Netflix – the American company that provides users with streaming video of movies and series. The goal was to obtain licenses for showing their own streams from major film studios. Among other projects were subsidiary sites such as MegaClick, MegaKey, MegaVideo, MegaLive, MegaBackup, MegaPay, and MegaBox. The latter would give artists 90% of the earnings from the site and could become a platform through which they could sell movies to their fans. "We wondered how we could improve copyright principles. How can we make it so that a digital copy of a movie brings direct benefits to both actors and creators?"
Kim's team understood that his projects, like other similar platforms for distributing digital multimedia content, infringed copyright at the beginning of their establishment, but from all this, a sanctioned and legal business model could arise.
Fragment of an audio recording of Kim's phone call with Universal Music:
UM Representative: Your technology is already working and functioning, right?
Kim: Yes, that's correct!
UM Representative: I would be happy to make a deal with you guys, that’s not an issue!
Kim: Awesome! Incredible, I'm so glad to hear that! We received a lot of negativity from representatives of the content industry because of MegaUpload, you know?
UM Representative: Well, I can talk to certain people to get you removed from the 'blacklist' and moved to another list.
Kim: If that moves from 'black' to neutral, and then from neutral to 'white', I think that would be fair!
UM Representative: Yes, we can do that!
Kim: Great, I will be waiting.
Kim thought about the fact that soon his file-sharing service would transition to legal platforms. The film industry was also considering such an outcome, and it was sending them into a panic. "This is a violation! This is bad! Stop this!"
Steve Fabrizio, the Senior Executive Director of the Motion Picture Association of America, stated that essentially, MegaUpload was just a copycat of existing piracy sites. There was nothing new in what they did, they simply did it better than others. Their entire business model revolved around distributing content for which MegaUpload did not hold the rights.
Jonathan Zittrain, a professor of law and computer science at Harvard University, told the filmmakers of the Dotcom documentary: 'As time went on, this guy became a multimillionaire. His resource had a dual purpose: people not only used it to share vacation photos with friends while others paid to download them much faster, they downloaded movie after movie, again and again!'
'Kim Dotcom made himself a lot of money. Did he spend any of those funds to support the art he was distributing for free? No! Moreover, the author of any creation has rights, which are enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, signed by the UN, not the Motion Picture Association of America. Therefore, a person has the right to protect their moral and material interests. This is serious!' — this was the opinion expressed by journalist and author Robert Levin, whose books users could also download from Kim’s file-sharing site — 'If you want to give it away for free, go ahead; if you want to show it, show it; if you want to burn it to a disc, project it into space, show it on airplanes — that’s your right. But by selling content, Kim was violating the rights of many people.'
'When someone like Dotcom creates a website, hosts movies on it, and makes millions from it to buy yachts, estates, and private jets, I see this as parasitism!' — says film producer Jonathan Taplin, 'He is a parasite who drains the lifeblood from the united body of artists! He is a criminal and deserves to be in prison!'
In 2011, at the Auckland recording studio Roundhead, Kim began recording an album of his own songs. At that time, he was working on the music website MegaBox, which he saw as a real threat to music labels, as this site helped musicians bypass intermediaries in selling their work. "These labels are monopolists who steal from musicians," Kim sincerely believed that by striking at the profits of record companies, he could improve the well-being of singers and musicians, saying, "Musicians loved my idea; they were excited and wanted to participate in our project. They wanted to promote the company just as we did."
The lyrics of the song "MegaUpload Song": "I will send files across the world, I use MegaUpload, Send me a file today, MegaUpload" were sung by many musicians, and featuring Prince Boad, Kim Dotcom, and Macy Gray, released on YouTube on December 17, 2011, was viewed by over 15 million people. The video featured renowned artists such as P Diddy, Will.i.am, Alicia Keys, Kanye West, Snoop Dogg, Chris Brown, The Game, and Mary J. Blige.
With his video, Dotcom "flipped the bird right in the face of Hollywood record companies." Music writer Gabriella Coleman says, "It was astonishing because many labels representing these celebrities were not at all pleased to see this promo. Its message did not quite align with the studios’ stance that any infringement of copyright harms musicians rather than helps them."
What is happening? Musicians support Kim Dotcom and MegaUpload at a critical moment. Kim is a PR master; he knows what truly works and impacts the public. In this sense, Dotcom turned out to be a genius, and Hollywood had no idea he was capable of this. It was a complete surprise.
"Hello, I'm Alicia Keys, I use MegaUpload!", "Hello, I'm Naomi Campbell,...", "Hello, I'm Demi Moore...", "Hello, everyone, I'm Kim Kardashian, and I love MegaUpload."
Hollywood's Enemy No. 1
These people are fools! Wave a small check in front of them, and they will appear anywhere! You see, it's very sad!" — said Hollywood producer Jonathan Taplin about the actors and musicians who supported Kim, — "The music business wasn’t like this before. And now all these Kim Dotcoms… people want to make money so badly that they're ready to do anything.
Entertainment moguls felt that Kim was simply provoking them by living in a huge mansion, owning all these cars, and living a luxurious life. They believed that he was doing all this at their expense.
Kim Dotcom's personal fleet in the courtyard of his New Zealand mansion.
He needed to be stopped, and in some sense, he brought trouble upon himself. Hollywood's film industry long viewed Dotcom as its enemy, and it has immense political influence in the U.S. This implies influence in the corridors of power, the White House, and Congress.
Chris Dodd, head of the Motion Picture Association of America, the most influential lobbyist in Hollywood, told Fox News that the industry intends to withdraw financial support for the president. "It's naive to think that just because we did this in the past, we will do the same now. The industry is closely watching who will stand up for it in times of threat!"
He made it clear to Barack Obama, who was running for a second presidential term: "If you do not give us what we want, do not expect financial help from us for the election campaign."
Hollywood indeed pressured the president and the U.S. government to close Dotcom's pirate site. "If you stand between America and its money — expect big problems!"
January 19, 2012. Capture
From secret communication of FBI agents: "Tomorrow is the target's birthday. The attendance of most invited guests is expected."
Original video from security cameras captures events at Dotcom’s mansion starting at 6:15 AM. By the way, the cameras really do record sound, as one of Kim's neighbors suggested, and from quite a distance. The footage shows two police vans and three patrol cars approaching the mansion.
A recording from a police helicopter shows a command being broadcast to the ground team to take position at the mansion gates. Two agents leap over the fence; one quickly approaches a guard who is talking to a police officer at the gate, twists his arms behind his back, and leads him to a police van.
A helicopter lands on the lawn in front of the house, and a group of heavily armed agents jumps out and rushes into the house through the front door. The radio transmits the hostage rescue team's communications: "We are in the house, approaching the object's bedroom. The door is shut, and it has a code lock. We breached it and entered. He has escaped! We don't see him in the studio or the bedroom."
"We have taken the garage occupants. Three individuals. We are proceeding with the arrest procedure."
"The physical location of the target is in front of the building. Key directive: one of the male subjects mentioned the name 'Finn.' He has been arrested."
"We see the nanny and his children on the garage roof."
"Target located. Security room, third floor. - 'Confirming presence of the target.'"
From the secret correspondence of FBI agents: "We were thrilled and had a great time. We are absolutely overjoyed with the outcome!"
The case of Kim was heard by the District Court of the Northern Coast of New Zealand. He and his team were arrested on charges of violating US copyright laws, money laundering, and extortion. In New Zealand, the court seized Dotcom's luxury vehicles worth $6 million and over $10 million in cash, obtained from several New Zealand financial companies. Soon new details of the raid emerged: police reported that when they arrived with two helicopters, Dotcom had locked himself in the security room with electronic locks on the doors. When the doors were breached, they found Kim holding a sawed-off shotgun.
The court charged Kim with illegal firearms found in a loaded condition at the mansion. Given the severity of the charges, the court denied him bail.
According to FBI reports presented in court during the reading of the indictment, Kim Dotcom earned $175 million from criminal operations, causing copyright holders damage amounting to half a billion dollars.
"He was classified as a criminal because he was a criminal and continues to be one, and not the least of them. The fact that he did not commit violence does not mean that his actions were not criminal in nature. People are sent to prison for securities fraud, and physical harm has nothing to do with it," said Steve Fabricio, SEO of the American Association of Companies. - "He harmed at least two million people who earn a living in the film industry. He compromised small businesses that create platforms for distributing content online while playing by the rules."
February 22, 2012. Release
Kim exits the courthouse, and reporters immediately approach him. "Hi, Kim! How are you?" — "I'm glad to be going home to see my three children and my pregnant wife. I hope you understand that I don't want to say anything more right now!". But the reporters do not back off: "How were you treated in prison?". Kim replies again: "I want to go home to my family! Sorry, gentlemen!"
"What about the extradition hearing in the U.S.? Will you fight it?". Cameras follow Kim to the car. "Yes, I will fight it!".
So, after 31 days behind bars and posting bail, Kim was released. The court was to continue hearing the case and, at the "urgent request" of U.S. authorities, address the issue of extraditing Kim and his associates, each of whom faced approximately 80 years in prison as a threat from American justice.
Home video footage captured the reunion of Kim with his wife and children. Kim does not hide his tears. "We felt like we were living in a rainbow bubble! Until that raid, everything had been going too well for us...".
The video camera recorded Mona in the maternity ward of a New Zealand district hospital giving birth to twin daughters. Kim, wearing a hospital gown and cap, sits by the mother's bed, gazing at the babies with admiration and love.
"Today I became a father again," says Kim, — "They are two beautiful girls, two little pirates!". "It's wonderful that I was released early and got to witness the birth of the twins. It energized me and reminded me that I need to continue my fight, to fight for them!"
Translator's note:
In 2014, Kim and Mona separated after five years of marriage, during which they had a son and four daughters. Mona and the children live in Queenstown, a town on the shores of Lake Wakatipu in New Zealand's South Island, surrounded by the picturesque Southern Alps.
In February 2018, 44-year-old Kim Dotcom married 22-year-old Elizabeth Donnelly. The couple met online. While 20-year-old Liz was having lunch with friends at the Botswana Café on Auckland's waterfront, her smartphone displayed a message on Instagram from a stranger. He wrote that he had seen her photo online and wanted to get to know her. They spent the entire lunch exchanging messages, and then Dotcom invited her and her friends to his penthouse at Princes Wharf, just a five-minute walk from the waterfront. They started by just talking, texting, chatting, and meeting again...
In 2016, Elizabeth visited Dotcom's mansion in Coatesville for the first time, and Kimmo, his son, who was visiting his father at that moment, said: "Dad, she deserves an 11 out of 10!"
"I’m not the first or the last girl to fall in love with a man who's old enough to be her father," says Liz Dotcom, "I have never been upset by what people say about Kim or what the press writes about him. The truth hurts, but none of that gossip is true!"
Kim Dotcom's second wife, Elizabeth. February 2018.
So, Kim was released on bail, the amount of which remains unknown. Kim tells the film crew that when they were arrested and the charges were read out, he just laughed because they sounded so absurd. "I knew we were innocent, that we hadn’t committed any of the crimes we were accused of. I told my lawyers that this would end very quickly." He assured his attorneys that proving the innocence of the founders of MegaUpload would be very easy.
While in custody, Kim read numerous newspapers filled with articles about his arrest, his persona, and his lavish lifestyle. They claimed he resisted arrest with a gun in hand and that a lot of unregistered weapons were found in his home. Kim was surprised at how far all of this was from the truth. It was completely false, and in his first interview after the arrest, Dotcom decided to clarify all the circumstances of the case.
“Of course, everyone knows that the internet is used for illegal activities, and I believe all online entrepreneurs have faced the same challenges as we have. YouTube, Google – we are all in the same boat. Our lawyers have always assured us that we are protected from legal troubles and safeguarded by the DMCA – the American law that protects the interests of online service providers from the actions of unscrupulous users.”
Kim's team of lawyers argued to the court that Dotcom's actions were no different from those of other file-sharing services, where the owners cannot be held accountable for the piratical actions of users. That’s it; there’s nothing more to discuss, and the charges should be dropped. The U.S. government asserted that the site was originally created to encourage people to upload valuable content such as newly released movies, music hits, and the like.
In an interview with the film crew of 'Caught in the Web,' Kim emphasizes how important it is to note the following: “I should not have found myself in a situation where I have to defend myself against extradition simply because there is no legal basis for that in New Zealand.” U.S. authorities had to prove to the court that the extradition agreement between the U.S. and New Zealand included a clause on copyright. However, the court saw nothing like that. In Dotcom's opinion, “this is just fabrication. U.S. authorities are fabricating such documents to create a case where there should be none.”
One of the representatives from the U.S. states that their New Zealand partners completely messed up the Dotcom case from start to finish. For instance, the search warrant used during the raid at Kim's estate was supposed to specify the alleged criminal act that served as the basis for this action. However, the warrant did not contain any references to a criminal article and was written in an incredibly vague manner.
The New Zealand police copied data from laptops seized at Dotcom's house during a raid. The court ruled that this evidence must remain in New Zealand, after which the FBI took copies of the data and sent them to the USA. This was unprecedented, as copies of computer data are not accepted by the court as evidence, because during the process of copying original information from the laptop's hard drive to an external device and its transportation to forensic experts, changes could have been made. Dotcom's rights, procedural norms - everything was violated, and this needed to be somehow corrected.
Many people continue to believe that Dotcom has a clear criminal talent, as he always seemed to know how far he could illegally bend the law with relative impunity. Kim knew exactly under what circumstances the prosecution would unsuccessfully attempt to prove the criminal intent. For instance, at the second trial in Germany, when he was accused of misappropriating funds from investors involved in Kim's 'megaprojects', he readily stated that he was blinded by the opened prospects and did not understand that he would not be able to repay the debt.
In defending MegaUpload, Dotcom heavily relied on worn clichés about greedy players in the media content industry, restrictions on free internet, and the slogan 'Copyright is universal evil!'. The statement 'The biggest pirate is Google; they are no better than us!' and a photo of Dotcom in a black beret on Twitter, styled like a portrait of Ernesto Che Guevara, earned him understanding and sympathy from millions of internet users. 'If he is not quite the noble Robin Hood, he is certainly not the ruthless pirate Francis Drake.' Kim Dotcom always knew what to appeal to, although his image as a fighter for internet freedom was seriously tarnished by his love for money and luxury.
Continuation will be available very soon…
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Source: habr.com
