If the photo is any indication, the game piracy business has not been especially lucrative for this Twin Falls, Idaho resident. The suspect, raided along with 31 others earlier this week, possessed but a single mod chip when the feds came calling.
A message posted on the Console Tech forums includes scans of what appear to be a federal agent's search warrant application as well as an inventory of items seized in Wednesday's sweep, which targeted game piracy suspects in 16 U.S. states. The inventory list includes:
6 Xboxes, an Xbox 360, an (unspecified) Nintendo console, 38 Nintendo games, a computer, a mod chip, various circuit boards, hard rives, discs, manuals, etc.
It would seem that the unnamed resident of the Idaho Falls home must have provided the scanned documents after receiving a copy from the agents who conducted the search. Not shown is the probable cause affidavit, which would have explained the government's basis for the search. That document apparently remains sealed by a federal court.
Posted along with the scans was a somewhat cryptic description of the raid:
LGC's house was raided at 8 this moring by the FBI, they took everything from his computer and xbox's, to his super nintendo. They were apparently looking for mod chips, and burnt games. He is not in jail, but he now has no computer at his house.
I have spent most of the day, on and off of the phone with him. He has the worst luck ever.
Comments
Completely, utterly, and absolutely ditto on my end.
Nope, it's kind of worrying that the probable cause is sealed when the results of the search are so sparse.
Plus the poor guy will likely be getting his stuff back smashed if he gets it back at all.
Really?
What's really scary is that according to one report from Ohio, apparently a soldering iron was considered a big find. Apparently having the tools to tinker with, or repair electronics is now on it's way to being evidence of a desire to break copyright.
pretty much soon you will need a license to have scrap electronic parts for fear you might invent or circumvent and stir up the very authoritarian system of retail media and electronics...
What scares me even more is how the probable cause affidavit is sealed. I thought the very purpose of probable cause was to protect people against unreasonable search and seizure? Why shouldn't the person in question be notified of WHY is twas allegedly reasonable?
No the VC and sonys version of it have thos lovely legal contracts signed and dotted so that when you buy it its not illeagle,even the ahrdware emulation is not because the company that owns it has the right to emulate it.
The DMCA includes a line that makes it illegal to circumvent copy protection. Since most mod chips need to do this for one reason or another, they run afoul of that provision. In short it's illegal because the DMCA stomped all over fair use.
Fucking ridiculous.