U.S. clamps down hard on piracy – 70 websites shut

The U.S. federal forces are coming down hard on websites that are selling counterfeit and pirated products – shutting down 70 websites last week.

These websites offered many goods, such as golf clothing and equipment, scarves and even rap music. The domain names have been seized by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, part of the Department of Homeland Security, under court approved warrants.

ICE are using proceduring based in criminal cases, including the seizing of domain names and assets of suspect websites without prior notification of their owners, lawyers said. Chris Castle, a Los Angeles attorney told the Wall Street Journal “It's time to stop playing games”.

Castle also said that the crackdown on illegal trading has been welcomed by major labour unions who say that sales of counterfeit and pirated goods can cost American jobs.

Torrent-Finder, a website offering lists to various files was affected. Site own Waleed GadElKareem, of Alexandria, Egypt said he was given no advance warning of the seizure of his domain by the U.S. government or his Web Hosting company.

Sites such as mygolfwholesale.com, sunglasses-mall.com and silkscarf-shop.com were also shut.

KitGuru says: shutting without any warning is certainly the way to play hard ball.

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