Kevin J. O’Connor, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, announced that JEFFREY LERMAN, also known as “asdgadg,” “kall,” “ht,” and “reg,” age 23, of College Park, Maryland, was sentenced today by Chief United States District Judge Robert N. Chatigny in Hartford to three years of probation, the first six months of which LERMAN must serve confined to his home. Judge Chatigny also ordered LERMAN to pay a fine in the amount of $7500. On March 8, 2005, LERMAN waived indictment and pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement. This matter stems from a multinational software piracy investigation known as “Operation Higher Education.”
In pleading guilty, LERMAN admitted that, between January 2002 and April 2004, he was a participant in the “warez scene,” an underground online community consisting of individuals and organized groups who engage in the large scale reproduction, modification and distribution of copyrighted software over the internet. Specifically, LERMAN was a prominent member of the warez group known as “Kalisto,” where he served as a “ripper” for pirated copies of computer games so that each game would fit onto a single CD-ROM. LERMAN eliminated or circumvented the games’ copy protection controls in order to facilitate the further unauthorized distribution of the games over the internet. From June 2000 to April 2004, Kalisto was responsible for releasing to the warez scene pirated copies of more than 500 well-known, copyrighted computer games, often before the date of their legitimate commercial release.
“Operation Higher Education” is the largest component of the global law enforcement action known as “Operation Fastlink,” announced by the Department of Justice on April 22, 2004. Twelve nations participated in “Operation Higher Education.” The investigation yielded searches and seizures of more 70 high-level targets that were conducted in Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, the Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, the United States, as well as Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
“Operation Higher Education” was conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s New Haven office in coordination with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Connecticut and the Department of Justice’s Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section (“CCIPS”). Assistant United States Attorney Edward Chang prosecuted this case.
Federal Online Piracy Crackdown, Four Sentenced David Chen Pui, 27, of Fountain Valley, Calif., and David Lee Pruett, 35, of Auburn, Washington, were sentenced to prison terms of 12 and 18 months, respectively, Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher of the Justice Department's Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Gretchen C.F. Shappert of the Western District of North Carolina announced today. Pui and Pruett were sentenced for their involvement with online software piracy. They were prosecuted as a result of the Charlotte, N. C., component of Operation FastLink.
Internet Piracy Groups 5 Charged Five individuals were charged with criminal copyright infringement in Charlotte, North Carolina, as part of an ongoing federal crackdown against international online piracy groups responsible for most of the illegal distribution of copyrighted movies, software, games and music on the Internet, Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher of the Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Gretchen C. F. Shappert of the Western District of North Carolina, and FBI Special Agent-in-Charge Kevin B. Kendrick of the Charlotte Division announced today.
Internet Piracy Crackdown The raids, two headed by Staffordshire Trading Standards and one by Flintshire County Council Trading Standards, were initiated from evidence gathered by ELSPA’s Internet investigator and resulted in the arrest of three individuals.
A new on-line platform successfully trialed in municipalities in Greece, Spain, Italy, and Germany can save citizens and local authorities time and money in the transfer of paper documents from country to country.
Researchers have developed and successfully tested an IT system to help put European public administrations on the same page in dealing with laborious cross-border information exchange. The aim was to find a better solution for public authorities working across different countries, to simplify the moving process for citizens.
Four-Year Analysis of Online Publishers Association Internet Activity Index Shows Sustained Growth for Online Content
Internet users are spending nearly half their online time visiting content, a 37% increase in share of time from four years ago, according to the 
Christopher William Smith, the owner of Xpress Pharmacy Direct, an Internet business, will spend the next 360 months in federal prison for operating an illegal online pharmacy. Smith, age 26, of Prior Lake, Minnesota, was sentenced by United States District Court Judge Michael J. Davis earlier today in Minneapolis. Following a six-week jury trial that ended in November of 2006, Smith was convicted of one count of conspiracy to distribute and dispense controlled substances, three counts of unlawfully distributing and dispensing a controlled substance, three counts of introducing misbranded drugs into interstate commerce, one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, and one count of operating a continuing criminal enterprise.
Universal Music Group (UMG) is continuing the testing of digital sales of tracks and albums without digital rights management (DRM) by making thousands of its albums and tracks available from its digital repertoire in MP3 form without DRM enabling, for a limited time.
The experiment will run from August to January and analyze such factors as consumer demand, price sensitivity and piracy in regards to the availability of open MP3s.
An eBay seller is taking on Universal Music Group (UMG) in court after the record industry giant targeted his online music sales with false claims of copyright infringement.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the San Francisco law firm of Keker & Van Nest LLP are representing Troy Augusto, whose online auctions included sales of promotional CDs distributed by Universal. Augusto does business on eBay under the name Roast Beast Music and specializes in sales of rare and collectible music.