Operation D-Elite and "domain-hijacking" elitetorrents.org
As part of "Operation D-Elite":
[On May 25, 2005], agents of the FBI and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) executed 10 search warrants across the United States against leading members of a technologically sophisticated P2P network known as Elite Torrents. Employing technology known as BitTorrent, the Elite Torrents network attracted more than 133,000 members and, in the last four months, allegedly facilitated the illegal distribution of more than 17,800 titles - including movies and software - which were downloaded 2.1 million times.
In addition to executing 10 warrants, federal agents also took control of the main server that coordinated all file-sharing activity on the Elite Torrents network. Anyone attempting to log on to Elitetorrents.org today will receive the following message: "This Site Has been Permanently Shut Down by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement."
(my emphasis).
My first reaction, when I heard what had happened to Elitetorrents.org : Talk about domain-hijacking - that's got to leave a mark.
There was some speculation the site had simply been cracked, but the press-release established that it was truly done by the government. The technical method is somewhat confusing. The Elitetorrents.org site now has a frame which points to an IP address (192.31.21.68) of a machine at sdsc.edu (San Diego Supercomputer Center), but that IP reverse-resolves to "www.dhs.gov". And there's a red-text-on-red-background "RTJKJAS" which some people thought was a cracker tag.
After too much time spent investigating this myself, I've concluded that yes, the elitetorrents.org site is indeed now being run off someone's desktop machine at SDSC. In fact, (alert - not an echo here!) I think I have a pretty good guess as to the name of the person doing it. But there's no hard evidence, just a likely candidate. And they're legit, so there's probably nothing for me to do with that information. If I were a organization-backed journalist, I'd try for some sort of exclusive interview. But as a "citizen" journalist (which is an alias for unsupported, unpaid, free-lancer), I don't want to mess around with the Department of Homeland Security. I just don't.
By the way, does anyone in my tiny reader base know the legal authority for the government to domain-hijack a site like this? I'm sure there's some justification, seizure of apparatus in a criminal enterprise or some such. But ... isn't there a First Amendment issue here? Has it been definitely ruled on, in the case of domain names? If someone owned a radio station, and were accused of similar copyright violations, could the government start out as here, by taking control of the radio station, and replacing everything with the continual broadcast of a similar message? It strikes me that the accused are being denied a critical method of putting forth their side of the story, the one place people would most naturally look for it.
By Seth Finkelstein | posted in copyblight | on May 27, 2005 11:59 PM (Infothought permalink)
Maybe EliteTorrents.org hadn't entered proper WHOIS information for their domain.
Seth, I suspect the government's ability to seize property including domain names, would rely on law similar to the ones used to seize property of suspected drug dealers, racketeers and similar "suspected" equipment or property either a fruit of criminal acts or enablers.
Note: I'm not an attorney or even very knowledgable of the law. I'm relying on common knowledge of the seizure of property in other types of crimes.
The question of their ability to do so is an interesting legal question. I'd be interested in hearing from someone who isn't speculating like me. Maybe you could put the question to one of the attorneys who blog?
KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK. I AM IMPRESSED WITH YOUR COMMENTS ON JEW WATCH I WAS SURPRISED OF THE BS THAT WAS POSTED. WITH ALL THE DRAMA OF LIFE WHY DO WE HATE THE TRUTH. JC