Warez Leader Faces 10 Years in Jail
Written by enigmax on February 21, 2007After spending nearly 3 years in a detention center fighting his extradition from Australia, a leader of notorious warez group ‘DrinkorDie’ was yesterday arraigned before a U.S. District Court to face charges of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement and one count of actual criminal copyright infringement. If found guilty he faces 10 years in jail & a $500,000 fine.
Founded in Moscow in 1993, DrinkorDie (DoD) was a major underground warez network who, amongst many other achievements (including the release of their own DVD ripper) embarrassed Microsoft by pre-releasing Windows95 2 weeks before its official launch. DoD consisted mainly of university undergraduates and was heavily supported by employees of software houses, whose role would be to leak copies of software to the group.
Considered by many to have reached their peak before the dawn of 1997, DoD remained firmly on the FBI’s radar. In 2000, U.S. Immigration and Customs began their investigation into DOD and other warez networks such as RiSC, RAZOR1911, RiSCISO, Request To Send (RTS), ShadowRealm (SRM), WomenLoveWarez (WLW), and POPZ. In 2001 DoD was busted during US Customs co-ordinated raids as part of Operation Buccaneer.
More than seventy search warrants were carried out globally across 12 countries, including raids in the US, Australia, Great Britain, Finland, Norway and Sweden with the subsequent arrest of 65 people.
The investigation claimed to have revealed two leaders of DoD. The first, 28 year old US citizen John Sankus Jr from Philadelphia aka ‘eriFlleH’ was convicted and sentenced in 2002, receiving 46 months in a federal prison (along with co-conspirator, Barry Erickson, who was sentenced to 33 months). At the time, US Attorney Paul McNulty said “John Sankus and his techno-gang operated in the faceless world of the internet and thought they would never be caught. They were wrong. These sentences, and those to follow, should send a message to others entertaining similar beliefs of invincibility.”
The second leader is claimed to be 44 year old Hew Raymond Griffiths, a British national and previous resident of Bateau Bay, Australia. After fighting extradition to the US from an Australian detention center for the last 3 years, Griffiths finally lost his battle in the Australian courts and yesterday was brought before Magistrate Judge Barry R. Poretz sitting in U.S. District Court, Alexandria, Va.
According to the indictment, it is claimed that Griffiths, aka “Bandido,” was an established leader of DrinkOrDie and a major player in the ‘warez’ scene. It is claimed that he also held important positions in other warez groups including Razor1911 and RiSC.
“Griffiths claimed to be beyond the reach of U.S. law, and today, we have proven otherwise,” said Assistant Attorney General Alice Fisher. “This extradition represents the Department of Justice’s commitment to protect intellectual property rights from those who violate our laws from the other side of the globe.”
“Our agents and prosecutors are working tirelessly to nab intellectual property thieves, even where their crimes transcend international borders,” said U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg.
The Court claims that prior to its dismantling, DrinkOrDie was estimated to have enabled the illegal reproduction and distribution of more than $50 million worth of pirated media including software, movies, games and music.
However, its is worth noting that it has never been proven that any member of DoD profited financially from their activities. Indeed, at the trial of other DoD members in the UK in May 2005, Bruce Houlder QC, prosecuting, said he acknowledged that the defendants were not involved in the software piracy scene to make money but rather they saw themselves as latter-day Robin Hoods, stealing from the rich to give to the poor.
For many in the warez scene and beyond, this is how DoD will be remembered.
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43 Responses
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I wish good luck to the DoD members! fught the power!
Its sickening to read about thie.
To be extradited to another country for piracy, thats so utterly disturbing.
Fuck ‘em and their law
srew that!
Good luck to them, and a really big fuck you to all those companies behind the arrests & the goverments working for them.
These companies not only don’t loose to piracy, they proffit enormouslly from the distribution/promotion & in from the ‘complementary goods’ qhich piracy generates the need for; eg. (raquet+ball / blueray burner+pirate p3 games).
Just disturbing ….I hope that they will not extradite him….
All the best to the DoD members hang in there guys….
I hope those bitches rot in jail.
This makes me sick. This is one of those truly VICTIMLESS CRIMES that cause bloat in the US Judicial system, and force generally good people into jail terms stiffer than rapists and murderers. Its entirely possible to murder someone, or rob a bank, or commit some level of “terrorist” attack, and get off with a lighter sentence than guys like these, or that a-hole Kevin Mitnick got. Makes me ashamed to be an American.
If you really think that DoD committed a “victimless crime”, you need to take a really good, long look at yourself in the mirror, and get a reality check.
This is - BY FAR - not a victimless crime. Software publishers have to deal with BS like this on a daily basis, and it makes the programmers of said software trying to make a living an almost impossible task because some stupid kids want to steal from them and give their software away for free.
These people are trying to make a living. Idiots like DoD are simply glorifying in the fact that they’re releasing their software to everyone else for free because they feel it should be free.
Idiots.
It is victimless you fuckwit.
Most people wouldnt buy the software if there was no other option.
This is - BY FAR - not a victimless crime. Software publishers have to deal with BS like this on a daily basis, and it makes the programmers of said software trying to make a living an almost impossible task because some stupid kids want to steal from them and give their software away for free.
Oh boo hoo hoo. Bill Gates is the richest man in the world. Who’s fault is it if his employee programmers struggle to make a living?
the programmers of said software trying to make a living an almost impossible task because some stupid kids want to steal from them and give their software away for free.
You are an idiot. Programmers, while they aren’t pulling down what they used to, still make a good living. COTS software only accounts for something like %2 of total programming work. Almost the entire software industry relies on CUSTOM work, even though the press only focuses on COTS stuff.
The real wage pressure on programmers is from outsourcing. Programming is more vulnerable to outsourcing than anything except manufacturing.
[quote comment="53660"]I hope those bitches rot in jail.[/quote]
That’s a pretty ignorant response.
[quote comment="53585"]Its sickening to read about thie.
To be extradited to another country for piracy, thats so utterly disturbing.
Fuck ‘em and their law[/quote]
You seem to forget the crime was committed here. Where should they send him Denmark?
Software piracy is a crime here in Australia too. he should have been charged here, not extradited to the USA.
Just another example of the spineless Australian government bending over and taking it for Uncle Sam!
Yes, those rich bitched corporate America can make us pay all their stupid worthless fees to use their software… Yes, those rich bastards can suck our money from us… Personally, what’s wrong if someone takes maybe a hundred copies from you for free??? Those rich bastards still have other few hundred thousand rich bastards that pay….
Personally, I don’t support Warez, but they should take that into consideration… Wether they personally profited or not…
Corporate America is way to bureaucratic
i cant condone piracy, however i feel that the criminals should face punishment in their respective countries.
DOD, Razor1911 and RISC are the heroes I grew up with. I owe so much to you guys, F*ck the system, you improved the world by giving us hope that the megacorps don’t have all the power yet.
Just remember: One governments terrorist is another’s freedom fighter.
There is an answer to the problem of copyrighted software: Don’t use it. For pretty much every need out there, there is an Open Source, freely available solution. Operating systems such as Linux, FreeBSD etc, make using Windows illegally unnecessary. If no one uses the for-profit software, no one buys it, no one copies it and distributes it etc. These companies will lose money. Eventually they will go away.
I am saddened to hear that another country has bent over and taken it from the USA and simply extradited one of its citizens to that backward hole of injustice. Far better that the accused serve any time in their own country. In the USA, the laws seem made to support the profits of the big corporations, not the rights of the individuals (or why wasn’t SONY fined $1 Billion or so for their Rootkitting of millions of computer systems?).
This guy does not profit from his “crimes” yet Microsoft violated patents and is being forced to Pay $1.52 Billion in Patent Suit Damages. Yet none of those fuckers at microsoft go to jail for violating the law, they just write a big check. Somebody at M$ must have made the decision to violate the patents, so why isn’t the guy going to jail?
wow, aussie U.S. legal love-in. Australians are idiots for handing him over and the yanks are idiots for prosecuting him like this.
What a miscarriage of justice. I hope they get to their senses and realize that the 3 years served is more, far more, than enough.
[quote comment="53662"]This makes me sick. This is one of those truly VICTIMLESS CRIMES that cause bloat in the US Judicial system, and force generally good people into jail terms stiffer than rapists and murderers. Its entirely possible to murder someone, or rob a bank, or commit some level of “terrorist” attack, and get off with a lighter sentence than guys like these, or that a-hole Kevin Mitnick got. Makes me ashamed to be an American.[/quote]
how long before they discover this guy funded al qaeda
free dod!!!
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