A warning to all non-US webmasters...

US anti-piracy body targets foreign website owners for extradition

Please note; I am not posting this in support or advocacy of on-line piracy, however there are some things that are pretty-much only illegal in America which would be covered by this new policy.

The gist of the reasoning behind it is that the simple fact that all .com and .net domains are - regardless of where the site itself is hosted - resolved into their IP addresses via a server in America is considered enough of a link to accuse the site owner of committing a crime "on US soil".

Please let me re-iterate, I am not encouraging anyone to do anything illegal or immoral - but at the same time this new policy of the US anti-piracy body using a vague technicality to extend the jurisdiction of US law to cover the entire world is a complete abuse of power (& semantics).

So, my warning is: Obviously obey the laws of your own country - and definitely don't pirate - anyway; but also be careful, if you have a .com or .net domain to make sure you're not breaking any US laws either, regardless of whether what you're doing is legal in your country. They will prosecute you, and given how cowardly most other governments are in the face of US demands, you probably will be extradited & tried in the US!

I think this is going to be used only to target things like piratebay... I kind of agree with it too because while it seems that the US is just trying to extend jurisdiction to abuse power I think it's more aimed at the companies like piratebay that are based in foreign countries but targeted towards explicitly breaking laws here. These websites were working a loophole in the system that had to be closed. I don't think you can blame the US for retaliating.

the piratebay is a .org domain.

The law is aimed at theft or piracy, not all US law. Wow, can we please not twist things into stuff it's not.

No country legally allows theft or piracy of intellectual property, there are even UN and international treaties on the issue. All the US is saying is it's going to start trying to extradite you if you are hosting sites which do nothing but promote the theft of intellectual property.

If you can defend or somehow think it's right to steal someone else's work, I can't help you, but I find it pretty sad.

To be quite honest iHarrison, your entire first post in this thread is uneducated FUD with an aim at starting some kind of flame war discussion.

I'm going to lock this tread now since it has no point and is not based in fact.