Movie Pirates Busted by FBI

It might be harder to find a bootleg DVD on the streets of New York this week. You know all those piracy warnings you see in theaters and at the front of DVDs? They're not kidding. The FBI proved their commitment to cracking down on movie piracy this week by striking down two major rings that sold current films worldwide. The Guardian Unlimited broke the news, "Thirteen people were arrested in raids across New York City yesterday as part of an FBI strike on two movie piracy rings that authorities said specialised in sneaking digital camcorders into cinemas and shooting hit films, then duplicating and distributing millions of bootlegs worldwide. Officials said the rings had been operating since 1999 and were believed to be responsible for nearly half of all illicit recordings made in the US."

On the eve of the release of Superman Returns, a movie the piracy ring was planning to market widely, the FBI moved in to bust a ring that had international repurcussions. The Washington Post had some details on the scope of the operation, "Using computer file-sharing networks, the suspects distributed the counterfeit films to Pakistan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and other countries, said Michael Robinson, an anti-piracy official for the Motion Picture Association of America. Because counterfeiters sometimes bribe their way into advance screenings, their work can hit the black market before the movies are released in theaters, part of a broader scheme the movie industry says robbed it of an estimated $18 billion in global revenue in 2005."

So, now that the bootleg DVDs are off the street, how much time could the pirates end up getting? It's no small crime to illegally copy a movie, as reported by The BBC, "The arrests, which came after raids across the New York area, were the culmination of a three-year investigation conducted by the FBI. Each of the suspects could face five years in prison if convicted of conspiracy, copyright infringement and trafficking in counterfeit goods."

[Additional Sources: Guardian, BBC, Washington Post]