Release groups and digital copyright piracy

This study uses data gathered from three US Federal policing operations occurring between 2001 and 2005 that targeted release groups – organized file-sharing groups that obtain commercial content, remove the copyright protection features, and distribute it – and their illicit networks. This data was used to construct a crime-script of these groups’ modus operandi to discover methods of disrupting their criminal activities. The results indicate that Industry may increase the risk of releasing content through amendments in DRM, and law enforcement may increase the effort through targeting crackers in prominent release groups. As well, data from a sub-operation of Site Down known as Operation Copy Cat was examined to re-construct a 2-mode network of actors and servers that aimed to distribute copyrighted content. The results of this analysis reveal that although only three individuals received a term of imprisonment, there were as many as five other actors in the network with comparable network centrality that evaded this harsh sentence.