ITV digital arrests

rolfw

http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,575317,00.html



Seven arrested on ITV Digital fraud charges

Jason Deans
Tuesday October 16, 2001

Seven people were arrested today in connection with an alleged multimillion-pound operation to defraud ITV Digital through the mass production of pirate smart cards.

Four men and three women were detained at two business addresses in Stoke-on-Trent this morning.

The arrests followed an investigation by the Federation Against Copyright Theft (Fact), an industry group set up to fight counterfeiting on behalf of its members.

Police are also searching a separate business address in Tunstall and a house in Packmoor, both in the Stoke area.

Fact has been investigating the alleged unlawful mass production, counterfeit and sale of ITV Digital smart cards and hardware, which enable customers to access the pay-TV operator's channels.

ITV Digital has already launched more than 50 prosecutions relating to the alleged fraudulent copying and use of its smart cards.

It has been estimated 100,000 households could be using the illegal cards.

Detectives from Staffordshire Police were joined by uniformed officers for this morning's operation, codenamed Advantage.

Three of the men arrested, aged 27, 29 and 30, are from the Stoke area while the fourth, aged 29, is from nearby Newcastle-under-Lyme.

Two of the women are aged 18, the other is aged 19 and all come from the Stoke area.

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p

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 19-Oct-01 AT 01:52 PM (GMT) by 2old4this (admin)]A bit more info to the story.


"before things start going crazy, let me clear a few things up:

yes, neo technologies did get raided.
yes, everyone was arrested (i have included names and ages below)
yes, the neo mod release date has been affected.
yes, the neo mod is still coming VERY SOON...

the arrests have nothing to do with neo4, the neo staff have since been released as they did not do anything wrong. the police and f.a.c.t were miss informed.

it took around 30 police officers, 2 raid vans, 1 police car, 1 hire van and 1 7ton truck to clear out the neo building so you could imagine the kind of setup they have to handle their customers products with care.

the people arrested were:

aaaaa (27 - aka Raptor), bbbbb (30 - aka Morph), ccccc (29 - aka Guns), ddddd (29 no alias) i'm not going to mention the name's of the females but there were 3 of them aged 17/18/19.

rest assured the neo team is still running strong and so is the mod i believe raptor will be around sometime tomorrow. digital-forums has been closed by myself in the mean time."

the source http://xianaix.ps2newz.net/forums/showthread.php?threadid=168

Phil.

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I have edited this message to remove real names.
Policy of the board is that individuals can post their own real names but not those of others - 2old
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rolfw

Thanks for the update Phil, it's always good to get the whole and up to date story, also that Raptor and gang to whom many people are beholding, are not in going to be penalised .

It still however stands as a cautionary tale to those who actually are selling programmed cards and making very little secret of it, ITV digital and FACT will not stand still and allow the practice to continue unchecked.

Rolf

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