Eight charged in game-piracy crackdown

This year, the Federal Bureau of Investigation launched "Operation Site Down," a global initiative against hackers who illegally acquire, copy, and distribute copyrighted music, movies, and games over the Web.

As reported earlier in GameSpot, Site Down investigators are concentrating on individuals that are the "first providers" of copyrighted works to the "warez underground." Late last month, FBI raids resulted in the arrests of four individuals in San Jose, California. Overall, Operation Site Down (and a similar initiative, Operation FastLink) has resulted in a total of more than 200 search warrants, which have been executed in 15 countries, the US Department of Justice said.

Today, eight individuals arrested in Site Down raids were arraigned in a Charlotte, North Carolina, federal court. Each was charged with either criminal copyright infringement or conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement.

"Today's charges strike at the top of the copyright piracy supply chain--a technologically sophisticated, highly organized distribution network that provides most of the copyrighted software, movies, games, and music illegally distributed over the Internet," acting Assistant Attorney General John C. Richter said.

"This FBI Charlotte undercover operation was successful in identifying and collecting evidence against those individuals who were the primary source of pirated digital material around the globe," a DOJ spokesperson said.

Illegal copies of protected material moves quickly through a global network of duplicators and distributors, the DOJ said in a statement. "Software or movies are easily and cheaply converted to optical discs and distributed throughout the world from factories in Asia and elsewhere. Spammers regularly advertise cheap software that can be downloaded from websites or shipped from overseas, usually bearing the signature mark of the warez group that released it."