Truth rating: 10
6:04 pm, January 19th, 2012
(MegaUpload)
The U.S. federal government has taken down MegaUpload, the enormous file-sharing site endorsed by some major celebrities and partly run by Alicia Keys’ husband Swizz Beatz.
It’s the latest twist in a rapidly widening fight over online content that includes the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) legislation in Congress, which led scores of major websites to go dark on January 18 in protest.
In today’s dramatic shutdown of MegaUpload, the Department of Justice called the site an “international organized criminal enterprise allegedly responsible for massive worldwide online piracy.”
RELATED – WATCH: Kanye, Diddy, Jamie Foxx and Others Voice Support for MegaUpload
At the request of American officials, several MegaUpload executives, including Kim Dotcom (Kim Schmitz) were arrested in New Zealand.
Beatz, who is listed as the company’s CEO, was not named in the indictment.
In retaliation for the closing of MegaUpload, the hacker collective Anonymous claimed credit for taking down the websites of the Department of Justice, Universal Music, the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Assocation of America.
A “cyberlocker” site, MegaUpload allowed users to transfer large files – which were often copyrighted movies, games, TV episodes and music.
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