Megaupload Shutdown Ignites Fire Against Anti-Piracy Crackdown

Department of Justice and FBI officials ignited a fire against their anti-piracy crackdown because of the shutdown of popular file-sharing Web site Megaupload. Only a few hours after four Megaupload executives were arrested in New Zealand and Megaupload.com shuttered, hacker group Anonymous retaliated by attacking DOJ and White House Web sites.

ALL websites from the Mega family are down including Megaupload, Megavideo, Megapix, Megalive, Megabox & Megasong. FBI did their homework, was posted on Megaupload's Twitter feed Jan. 20.

Megaupload is reportedly part of one of the biggest criminal copyright infringement networks U.S. authorities have ever taken down. Seven people were indicted by a Virginia grand jury Jan. 19, and charged with racketeering, money laundering and other charges. Megaupload was allegedly using the Web site as a front for black market content swapping, and had many legitimate users on the site sharing many kinds of legal content. Members who felt cheated out of their money took to Facebook and Twitter to post their outrage.

F**k this Sh*t, why they took megaupload down like that? Fu**ing A**holes!, Facebook user Chris Nolan posted on the MegauploadForum Facebook Page.

Glad I switched to FileServe when MU expired last December. But now everything is showing as deleted or removed for copyright infringement on FileServe. Why does the US think they rule the world? Kim Langille posted on the same page.

Twitter had even more postings about the takedown.

Megaupload was taken down today. What's next? Google? Youtube? Facebook? Twitter? This is ridiculous! Twiiter user @_Tefo posted.

The Anonymous collective also used Twitter to spread their message about why they attacked government Web sites in response to the Megaupload takedown.

They think killing #megaupload will be the end of piracy. They're wrong: it's just the beginning of the revolt against censure, @AnonyOps posted Jan. 20.

On Megaupload's Facebook page, many people were posting rest in peace messages and thanking them for helping them download terabytes of content in some cases.

R.I.P. Megaupload. I have downloaded TBs of data from you. Now without you, I'd have to use other file sharing sites, but you'll be missed badly. :(, Piyush Shrivastava wrote.

Authorities estimate Megaupload made nearly $200 million dollars in illegal profits from selling pirated content, and warrants were being exectued in the U.S. and eight other countries in connection with the case. Tell us in the comments if you are a fan of file-sharing Web sites.