Pirate Pleads Guilty

[Suppafreak]

INTERNATIONAL DISTRIBUTOR OF PIRATED SATELLITE EQUIPMENT AND SERVICES AGREES TO PLEAD GUILTY

ENGLEWOOD, Colo., July 19, 2006 – EchoStar Communications Corporation (NASDAQISH) along with NagraStar announced today that another distributor in an international satellite piracy ring in Simi Valley, California has agreed to plead guilty in a California federal court to two felony offenses – theft of satellite signals and theft of trade secrets. The accused faces a maximum of 15 years in prison and a fine of more than $750,000 plus restitution.

Based on an extensive surveillance operation by EchoStar and NagraStar, the FBI executed a search and seizure warrant against Alexander Gluzman on March 3, 2006. Gluzman was found in possession of devices used for the unauthorized decryption of DISH Network’s satellite programming and is expected to be arraigned on the charges July 31st in a Los Angeles District Court.

Gluzman, who lives in the San Fernando Valley, admitted to distributing DISH Network satellite services and equipment to customers throughout the United States and Canada through emails and telephone calls. EchoStar Communications and NagraStar began to track Gluzman’s activity in 2005 and were able to record evidence that led to the search and seizure and the theft of satellite signals charge, a violation of Title 47, Section 605(e)(4).

The second charge, theft of trade secrets, a violation of Title 18, Section 1832 (a)(2), is the result of infractions against another national satellite provider discovered during the investigation. Gluzman has admitted to obtaining and unlawfully distributing trade secrets and proprietary information from that provider.

This is only one of many piracy investigations in recent months that EchoStar and NagraStar have followed through to prosecution. The companies have and will continue to fight those who try to circumvent the security system by illegally intercepting and descrambling the satellite signal being provided to legitimate customers.

You all think that I am making it up, but couple of years ago I worked with this dude's ex-wife. Infact at the time they were still married and I saw him couple of times at the copmany's events and at somepoint he did work for Dish Network.

 

[Smith P.]

What was the company name ?

 

[Suppafreak]

What was the company name ?

I can tell you, but then I would have to kill you.

 

[Smith P.]

Then I know - Broadcom

 

[Suppafreak]

Very good guess, but no.

 

[Smith P.]

Sanmina-SCI ?

 

[grb]

I wish Dish would get it locked down.

They could spend more money on technical solutions to prevent piracy, but they seem to prefer to spend money on auditing and harrassing their paying customers...

 

[HDTVFanAtic]

shaggy

Dish & Bell are secure for the time being so the FTA boxes cannot steal
(which makes us LEGAL FTa'ers happy)
and last I checked DirecTV was secure

So much for Directv being secure - as I theorized months ago, you cannot arrest or fine someone for something that doesn't work or exists:


Satellite Pirate Surrenders Loot
EchoStar Communications and its security partner NagraStar, along with Bell ExpressVu and DirecTV said that a settlement has been reached in the civil lawsuit against a Canadian man charged with illegal activities associated with satellite piracy. After reaching the settlement, defendant Steve Souphanthong - doing business as B-Tech Distribution - has agreed to pay the companies $500,000 in damages.

The companies involved in the civil lawsuit - filed in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice - alleged that Souphanthong was one of the largest manufacturers of piracy devices in North America and was engaged in creating, designing, manufacturing, selling, trafficking and distributing numerous high-profile piracy devices and software. Among the devices were ROM X cards and ISO programmers for use against EchoStar and Bell ExpressVu, and the Mikobu, Apollo 745 and Avenger line of products for use against DirecTV.

According to the companies, Souphanthong and his relatives and associates operated several well-known piracy websites like dssstars.com, dssstyle.com, dssorbit.com, dssavenger.com, huaccess.com, mikobux.org and hugadgets.com.

The companies involved with the case executed civil search orders against several different locations belonging to Souphanthong and seized large quantities of the piracy devices, business records and computer files. EchoStar, DirecTV, NagraStar and Bell ExpressVu also brought contempt motions against the defendant(s) and obtained orders freezing certain assets.

 

[Dish-Direc]

My Point Exactly

They could spend more money on technical solutions to prevent piracy, but they seem to prefer to spend money on auditing and harrassing their paying customers...

This is why I would not waste time to jump to thier defense on the distant locals loss. They deserve exactly this because they can not secure their encryption, resulting in alot of losses by retailers.

 

[RVD420]

I would like to see Dishnetwork go the same route as DirecTV.

Sue the daylights out of suppliers and end users.

It worked for DirecTV.

 

[Dish-Direc]

Court Action

I would like to see Dishnetwork go the same route as DirecTV. Sue the daylights out of suppliers and end users.

Courts been pretty harsh on Dish lately......but it needs to be done.

 

[sA :: Shaggy]

So much for Directv being secure

didnt i say something about this the first day it showed up.
I wish E* would get something worth paying for encryption wise, no of fence but it just seems way to easy, i bet you a 9yr old with 300 bucks could have it set up.

 

[digiblur]

I would like to see Dishnetwork go the same route as DirecTV.

Sue the daylights out of suppliers and end users.

It worked for DirecTV.

Actually it didn't work for them.

D* will never see one dollar from me because of their nazi tactics of suing everyone. Suing people who didn't even have satellite receivers or even a view to the south to catch their signal... they finally got slapped for it. I'm all for suing the pirates as long as they've actually have a means to hack the signal and do hack the signal.