One day after history's largest online protest, the U.S. Government nonchalantly responds with the middle finger. The Wall Street Journal reports: 

The FBI shut down Thursday one of the world's most popular file-sharing websites, MegaUpload.com, and announced the arrest of four of the people behind it in a global crackdown against the suspected online pirates.

Visit this link and sign the petition:

http://act.demandprogress.org/sign/megaupload_seizure/

Even if you're not in the US please sign the petition still because at this rate, other countries will follow the US' example.

Here -- check it out: If SOPA and PIPA pass it'll just broaden the government's power to shut down more file sharing sites.

As MegaUpload's website notes -- er... noted: 

The fact is that the vast majority of mega's Internet traffic is legitimate, and we are here to stay. If the content industry would like to take advantage of our popularity, we are happy to enter into a dialogue.

This is what we're up against.  Please tell President Obama and your lawmakers to put an end to it. NOW.

Thanks

They'll have about the same amount of success as they've had with the war on drugs if it passes. On a high note Rick Perry dropped out of the race for the republican nominee for President today!

well allejo, i signed the form against it, and its just big brother trying to even stop ordinary peoples freedom of the internet

McLEAN, Va. – Federal prosecutors have shut down one of the world's largest file-sharing sites, Megaupload.com, on charges of violating piracy laws -- a day after a 24-hour blackout of popular websites such as Wikipedia drew national attention to the issue.

"This action is among the largest criminal copyright cases ever brought by the United States," the Justice department said in a statement about the indictment.



The indictment accuses seven individuals and two corporations -- Megaupload Limited and Vestor Limited -- of costing copyright holders more than $500 million in lost revenue from pirated films and other content. It was unsealed on Thursday, and claims that at one point Megaupload was the 13th most popular website in the world.

Megaupload was unique not only because of its massive size and the volume of downloaded content, but also because it had high-profile support from celebrities, musicians and other content producers who are most often the victims of copyright infringement and piracy. Before the website was taken down, it contained endorsements from Kim Kardashian, Alicia Keys and Kanye West, among others.

The Hong Kong-based company listed Swizz Beatz, a musician who married Keys in 2010, as its CEO. Beatz declined to comment through a representative.

The individuals in the criminal enterprise each faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison on racketeering charges, five years for conspiracy to commit copyright infringement, 20 years on money laundering charges and five years on related charges.

Megaupload was led by colorful Australian Kim Dotcom -- aka Kim Schmitz, or Kim Tim Jim Vestor. He is a a resident of both Hong Kong and New Zealand, and a dual citizen of Finland and Germany, who legally changed his last name to "Dotcom."

The website's founder and "chief innovation officer" was once convicted of a felony but has repeatedly denied engaging in piracy, according to CNET.com -- and he made more than $42 million from the conspiracy in 2010 alone, according to the indictment.

The indictment comes the day after a 24-hour "blackout" of Wikipedia, a protest doodle on the homepage of Google, and numerous other protests across the Internet against proposed anti-piracy legislation that many leading websites -- including Reddit, Google, Facebook, Amazon and others -- contend will make it challenging if not impossible for them to operate.

The Protect Intellectual Property Act under consideration in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House are bills backed by the motion picture and recording industries intended to eliminate theft online once and for all. S. 968 and H.R. 3261 would require ISPs to block access to foreign websites that infringe on copyrights.

Online piracy from China and elsewhere is a massive problem for the media industry, one that costs as much as $250 billion per year and costs the industry 750,000 jobs, according to a 2008 statement by Patrick Leahy, D-Vt.

But how exactly the bills would counter piracy has many up in arms.

***

Hacker group Anonymous isn’t happy about the takedown of file-sharing site Megaupload, and as a result, it’s targeting some big companies and government agencies.

Earlier this afternoon, interspersed with a stream of anti-SOPA and PIPA tweets, the main Anonymous Twitter account declared, “The government takes down #Megaupload? 15 minutes later #Anonymous takes down government & record label sites. #ExpectUs.” Specifically, the group claimed responsibility for taking down the Universal Music, RIAA (the record industry’s lobbying arm), MPAA (the movie industry’s lobbying arm), and Department of Justice websites, among others. As of 3pm Pacific, the sites were still down for me, although some comments on Twitter suggested that they were returning online sporadically.

The group also claimed that the current attacks were “the largest attack ever by Anonymous,” with 5,635 participants. And it looks like the campaign is ongoing — Anonymous says it’s going after the FBI’s website next: “Get some popcorn… it’s going to be a long lulzy night.”

Originally Posted by mogembo

Hacker group Anonymous isn’t happy about the takedown of file-sharing site Megaupload, and as a result, it’s targeting some big companies and government agencies.

Earlier this afternoon, interspersed with a stream of anti-SOPA and PIPA tweets, the main Anonymous Twitter account declared, “The government takes down #Megaupload? 15 minutes later #Anonymous takes down government & record label sites. #ExpectUs.” Specifically, the group claimed responsibility for taking down the Universal Music, RIAA (the record industry’s lobbying arm), MPAA (the movie industry’s lobbying arm), and Department of Justice websites, among others. As of 3pm Pacific, the sites were still down for me, although some comments on Twitter suggested that they were returning online sporadically.

The group also claimed that the current attacks were “the largest attack ever by Anonymous,” with 5,635 participants. And it looks like the campaign is ongoing — Anonymous says it’s going after the FBI’s website next: “Get some popcorn… it’s going to be a long lulzy night.”

About time they did something. Kudos to Anonymous

More than happy to sign the petition, and go Anonymous hit em where it hurts :sneaky:

All sharing functionality on FileSonic is now disabled. Our service can only be used to upload and retrieve files that you have uploaded personally.

If this file belongs to you, please login to download it directly from your file manager.

Nice to see a counter attack from Anonymous, but the Megaupload incident already made some damage.
Filesonic have disabled files sharing services. They are scared, who will go down next?
Grab your popcorn and watch the web crumble...

Shame the goverment cant find better use of there time than mess with the regular ppl . I log on today to find Sonicfile is now running scared and has killed all share links - Shame Shame - they wont be in busines much longer - who is next ? I myself will find other ways to deliver my shares ( not many) to all ..

WoW - US gov. really needs to find something to do - Yet another one bites the dust in the fight - sadly Filesonic went with the pressure. Still see allot of links to FS.. Hope to be able to enjoy the shares that are out there...

Remer if there is a will there is a way - the shares will continue - even if the US gov. thinks they can compete with the brains of the web

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