Following a disgraceful email leak that threw hundreds of MB of MediaDefender emails out in the Internet, it is no surprise to see that The Pirate Bay will retaliate and take MediaDefender to court.
Apparently, MD has been using un-ethical and illegal techniques in order to bring down P2P websites.Usually on the other end of accusations of wrongdoing, The Pirate Bay is accusing media companies of hiring hackers to sabotage, create denial of service attacks and other hacking and spamming offenses, according to its blog:
Thanks to the email-leakage from MediaDefender-Defenders we now have proof of the things we've been suspecting for a long time; the big record and movie labels are paying professional hackers, saboteurs and ddosers to destroy our trackers.
The case is built on information revealed in Media Defender's leaked emails. The biggest offense being that back in July MediaDefender, hired by the Motion Picture Association of America, attempted to lure file sharers to a fake download site called MiiVi.com. Not satisfied to just snag your IP address and any other information, this site actually installed spyware on your computer. The spyware then checked hard drives for copyrighted material and reported back to MediaDefender.
It would be great if this lawsuit could succeed, to show security companies that entrapment is entrapment, even on the web. However, given the dubious nature in which the MediaDefender emails were obtained, there is doubt as to whether they will be admissible as evidence under Swedish law. The courts are expected to decide the validity of the case later this week.
The following companies are named in The Pirate Bay's complaint:
