Official "This website seized by feds" graphic

Boing Boing reader "ominous mouse" points us to a US Government official takedown graphic—the thing you'll see when a filesharing site (or some similar site which has run afoul of the law) is yanked. The example here can also be seen on tvshack.net, one of nine websites recently seized by the feds over pirated movies. The warrants for those takedowns were issued in Manhattan federal court, hence the reference to New York state. Reuters snip:

Kevin Suh, vice president of content protection for the Motion Picture Association of America, a Hollywood trade group, called the action, "Operation In Our Sites", the "largest takedown of illegal movie and television websites in a single action by the federal government."

I kind of want this graphic on a t-shirt.

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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Anonymous

Really want a T-Shirt?

OK, here you go…

http://www.cafepress.com/SEIZED_BY_FEDS

Pretty good Captcha = teamwork televised
voiceinthedistance

Don’t mess with Big Bird. The NIPRCC means business! Or lack thereof.

Sweet logo. A nice logo and emblem makes even ethnic cleansing or forced sterilization seem OK. I’d proudly display it on my sanitized site, if so honored.
pereubu

I dunno, I’m getting a whiff of the odor of bullshit. Although there is an agency called the NIPRCC, it’s part of the Department of Homeland Security, not DOJ. And it’s website not only shows no official seal, but the motto is just a little too snarkily ironic for Fed law enforcement types.

http://www.ice.gov/partners/cornerstone/ipr/index.htm
bersl2

Image makes me want to drop-kick something.
BlueSong

Was really gutted when I saw this on TVShack yesterday as its one of the best streaming sites out there, however its come back online at http://tvshack.cc also Watch Movies is back as http://www.watch-movies-tv.info/ so alls well :)
Anonymous

I’m seeding that graphic right now
Razzabeth

Yes, it is real, and it’s part of a huge story that, frankly, I am surprised that BoingBoing has not been covering.

Link to news article: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jwQ1KLdh2jwJK6a8QL3iv7fcWm1AD9GLS48G0

They invaded the homes of the people hosting these websites and confiscated all their computers and took all the money fro m their bank accounts. Even now they are being held and interrogated and probably having their rights completely stepped on. Please make it more public so that hopefully there will be an outcry and they can be with their families again. Don’t you think a punishment should fit the crime? These guys didn’t murder anyone, they just made BBC documentaries that were previously unavailable in the US available, and vice versa for US TV shows unavailable elsewhere.

Ninjavideo was the best of these sites and they released a Manifesto which can be found here: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=UEROOBGG
There is an impassioned audio version as well which is heartbreaking to listen to and inspiring at the same time. That and more can be found at ninjavideo’s Facebook page which is here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/NinjaVideo/42215188567

They also have a legal fund which one can donate to if you are so inclined.
- kromelizard
  
  I’m failing to see the need for outrage over what appears to be lawfully executed search and seizure on a criminal enterprise.
  - querent
    
    “Don’t you think a punishment should fit the crime?”
    
    Seems to me our federal law enforcement agencies should have better things to do than protect the profits of the entertainment industry.
    
    (Except that america doesn’t really produce anything else, I guess.)
- pidg
  
  “These guys didn’t murder anyone, they just made BBC documentaries that were previously unavailable in the US available”
  
  That’s very kind of them, but many millions of us Brits paid for those documentaries to be made. Stop stealing them or we’ll unleash more oil on you.
  
  ANYWAY, surely the bigger issue here is that they’re using a graphic instead of HTML, thus breaking the Web. Very disappointing.
mccrum

I’m tempted to just put this in place of my website instead of what I’ve got there now, just to make my site seem edgier than it is.
hawkface

I call bull. Has anyone checked the whois for some these domains, it is a private registration in China, or Brazil, or some no-name company. “This domain name has been seized” not likely, at least by the Gov’t. My guess is that they have been hacked. Something like this happened a while ago. Besides, the logo in the center is not real, and if ICE seized something, they would one, have a warrant, and two, take the physical server.
- Felton
  
  Did you not see the link to the Reuters news article, or do you think maybe they’re in on the hoax? :-P
- spcfgt
  
  Call bull all you want.
  
  This was
  
  a) Anticipated since the announcement by the Obama administration that services like this would be taken down
  b) Reported on by reputable sources who do their own fact checking
  c) THE IMAGE IS SHOWN AS AN AVAILABLE DOWNLOAD RIGHT FROM THE GOVERNMENT SITE http://www.ice.gov/pi/news/multimedia/archive/index.htm?top25=yes&year=all&month=all&state=all&topic=all !
  
  So the logo is definitely real. You might want to do some fact checking before posting crap like that.
  - hawkface
    
    @spcfgt You know what, I didn’t see the news article, and I don’t need to catch crap over an oversight, unless you’ve never made a mistake, lay off. I still think that this smells fishy. Check the whois for tvshack.net and IF the actual owner of the domain resides in the US, then ICE has full authority, with a warrant, to take property.
    
    @Felton No, I didn’t, I’m blind :P
Razzabeth

Oops, didn’t see that you already linked to the news article. Sorry my bad!
Anonymous

This was also posted on torrent freak a few days ago here http://torrentfreak.com/fed-busted-movie-site-informed-of-investigation-months-ago-100701/
Anonymous

Shouldn’t such a seized domain abide by section 508 (“agencies must give disabled employees and members of the public access to information that is comparable to the access available to others”)? It totally doesn’t at present, as it has all that information displayed in an image which lacks any kind of alternative text: “
” (Classy centering technique, too. So 1997!)

I hope someone sues… :D
Anonymous

What does homeland security and ice have to do with copyrighted material? Don’t they have more important things to be doing? I might add that the Obama admin has been stepping up the rights of the FBI and allowing them to evesdrop on more more of our online dealings with little or no judicial involvement.

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2010/07/28/general-us-fbi-internet-records_7806659.html
Anonymous

Find a seized websiteâ€™s new address or IP address at http://seizedserver.wordpress.com/
timquinn

Is it just a coincidence that this happened the same week that Hulu introduced Hulu+ to charge for the same content?
Anonymous

The gubmint should be ashamed for creating an official “seized” page that isn’t Section 508 compliant.
MaxEdRoom

I’m really surprised that this isn’t being talked about more here. It involves Disney, copyright and the Department of Homeland Security. Am I missing this somewhere else on this site?
Notary Sojac

If the operator of a pirate site were also to be an illegal alien, would ICE exercise its arrest powers, or would that only happen in Arizona??
sheffeazy

I thought that it sounded fishy until I found this.

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/1007/100702hollywood.htm

This is a government overstepping its ground.
Anonymous

I want to be an ICE agent after seeing the ICE badge. It is so beautiful.
Anonymous

I know, this is like a week or two late but.. Totally fake. Not like its on ICE website…
oh wait…
http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/1007/100702hollywood.htm
Ugly Canuck

You guys criminalize any copyright infringements lately?
If so – and I don’t know, but I suspect you have – this new Government (that is, publicly-owned & funded, by you dear taxpayer) signage protecting the rights of propertied people (usually not you) is no surprise.
It does give you, however, the “chapter and verse” of the Law they’re using to stops you from doing what ya used to do, so’s you can looks it up, if ya’s feels so inclined. I myself decline to do so, as summer’s short enough round hereabouts, without me burying my nose in musty foreign legal texts.
But FWIW, that citation of rules by number is pretty typical of US govspeak legalese, IIRC.
Anonymous

Bull? http://www.aipnews.com/talk/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=18168&posts=1

http://news.yahoo.com/s/mashable/20101127/tc_mashable/homeland_security_seizes_70_websites_for_copyright_and_trademark_violations
Ugly Canuck

Hey – I am unfamiliar with American heraldry…what kind of bird is that?
I recognize the eagles, but the center one has me stumped.
Ugly Canuck

Perhaps it’s a pied corvid of some type?
- Felton
  
  Haha! No, that’s not macho enough for an American bird. I do believe that’s a rare species of bird known as the “jingo.”
Felton

Like the eagle, it’s also a bird of pride.
Antinous / Moderator

The most sinister part of this is that the government has discovered drop shadows.
Anonymous

I love that the “National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Centre” has “IPR Centre” on their badge. “1%er” is also a badge/catchphrase of the Hells Angels.
Anonymous

the most of these sites do have already a new domain. us gov is kind of powerless, that makes me happy.

for example watch movies is now http://www.watch-movies-tv.info/ and tv shack just switched on a chinese domain look here http://tvshack.cc/

i’m sure the other webpages just switched the domains as well. cheers guys.
Anonymous

When seeing these images, it makes me feel more righteous in the fact that I know that these are just that – Images. They have no power over the domain of my mind, body or spirity-thing. I also would like everybody to know that I went to TPB right after reading this and took a nice deep breath.

Also, I’ve not found one streaming site that doesn’t suck up here in canada, especially when I want to watch full-def content.
benher

The chicken on the IPR logo in the center looks like it’s in serious need of amphetamines.
Anonymous

I’m sort of blaming Biden and therefore Obama for this, although who’s to say this wouldn’t have happened had the other guy won.
Gilgongo

“Protection is our trademark”

What kind of benighted idiocracy would you have to be part of to think that such a motto for a government agency would on any level – other than the comedic – make sense?

At what point would these people draw the line at exaggerated posturing? Really, it’s straight out of South Park!
Kaibaman

Although this is my first time posting on Boing Boing I have been a reader for almost 2 yrs now and yes my name comes from an Anime/Trading Card Game. However remember last year something like this happened similarly were it turned out it was a ScareWare. I have concluded by two things that this is just that. The Department of Justice Badge and the ICE Badge are fake. Not sure if the majority of commenters pointed that out in their heads but I’ll tell and show you why.

The Bald Eagles design isn’t in full detail like in this photo http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/26/US-DeptOfJustice-Seal.svg/600px-US-DeptOfJustice-Seal.svg.png

Plus Although ICE also goes into Intellectual Property the badge in the Graphic is not their, this is their badge http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/25/IcebadgeLG.jpg/425px-IcebadgeLG.jpg

When I first saw the ICE badge on the graphic, something hit me that its fake and sure enough it is.
everyplace

Assuming this is a government-run website after the seizure, they’re breaking their own policies by making new non-ADA compliant sites.
Anonymous

And now it re-directs to a Youtube video. Wow. Youtube? Really? the US government can’t get it’s own server for a video?
cjovalle

My complaint is that it’s technically inaccurate. Any time it says “without authorization” it should say “or lawful exemption.”
Antinous / Moderator

I kind of want it on a t-shirt.

You’d have to change the text to “This rack has been seized…”
- Xeni Jardin
  
  SNORT
neuromodder

I just copied that picture.
Anonymous

What about fair use? IMHO this notice (and all the FBI anti-piracy notices at the beginning of movies) misrepresent copyright law by omitting mention of fair use.
anarki

I noticed this yesterday at http://tvshack.net

Bad times!
dr000g

filespump.com as well.
Raj77

Ditto. I’m not a fan of how copyright operates, but I won’t cry when the existing law is enforced. These guys knew they were operating in breach, and for some reason they a) chose to do so in a country which regards that as a criminal matter and b) didn’t cover their tracks well enough.
Anonymous

watch movies. net as well, now I have to torrent instead of stream. That is bull shit
Anonymous

This is the problem of having one country having control of the Internet registry.

It would be interesting to find out if any of the sites taken like this where hosted else where.

If they where then the US has stepped out of bounds and there argument that the registry should not be moved out of there control because they would not interfere with is is null and void.
rwmj

What sort of creepy outfit is the “National Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Centre” … Is that a new US quango?