Pirates on The Huffington Post

Somali Sea Gangs Lure Investors To Lair With Pirate "Stock Exchange"

2009-12-01T16:53:43Z

HARADHEERE, Somalia, Dec 1 (Reuters) - In Somalia's main pirate lair of Haradheere, the sea gangs have set up a cooperative to fund their hijackings offshore, a sort of stock exchange meets criminal syndicate.

Somali Pirates Hijack Saudi Oil Tanker Going To US

2009-11-30T10:50:55Z

NAIROBI, Kenya – Crews on oil tankers aren't allowed to smoke above deck, much less carry guns, for fear of igniting the ship's payload. That's one of the main reasons Somali pirates met little resistance when they hijacked a U.S.-bound supertanker carrying $20 million in crude.

The Greek-flagged tanker – traveling from Saudi Arabia to New Orleans – had no escort when it was hijacked Sunday because naval warships are stretched too thin. The problem has been further exacerbated because pirates have expanded their operations to hundreds of miles out at sea.

Michael Crichton's "Pirate Latitudes" Has Blockbuster Movie Written All Over It

2009-11-25T11:03:25Z

Hoist the Jolly Roger above the bestseller list, ye mateys, 'cause Michael Crichton has just published a swashbuckling pirate thriller. The popular author of "Jurassic Park" and "The Andromeda Strain" went to Davy Jones's locker last November, but his assistant found a finished draft of "Pirate Latitudes" on his computer, and Harper has plundered this booty like a chest of gold doubloons that washed up on shore. The first print run is a million copies, and Steven Spielberg has already signed on to produce the inevitable movie version, so drop sail and prepare to be boarded.

Paul And Rachel Chandler, Kidnapped Britons, Say Somali Pirates May Kill Them Soon

2009-11-20T15:47:07Z

LONDON — A British couple being held hostage by Somali pirates said in an interview broadcast Friday that they fear they will be killed or handed to a terrorist group if a ransom is not paid soon.

Paul and Rachel Chandler were kidnapped by pirates on Oct. 22, who seized their 38-foot yacht – the Lynn Rival.

Operation Atalanta: Hunting The Pirates (VIDEO)

2009-11-18T11:27:27Z

NORTHWOOD, U.K. -- Almost every day now come reminders of why the European Union made a landmark decision a year ago that Somali piracy was a problem it had to fight.

Maersk Alabama Attacked By Pirates Again

2009-11-18T07:47:31Z

NAIROBI, Kenya — Guards aboard the Maersk Alabama used guns and a sound blaster Wednesday to repel the second pirate attack in seven months on the U.S. vessel at a time when ships are increasingly hiring armed security teams to thwart hijackings.

Despite an increased international flotilla of warships off the Horn of Africa, maritime figures indicate the number of ship boardings has remained about the same in the past year.

Somali Pirate Claims $3.3M Ransom Paid To Free 36 Hostages On Ship

2009-11-17T09:59:32Z

MOGADISHU, Somalia — As a Spanish warship looked on, a $3.3 million ransom was delivered by boat Tuesday and Somali pirates freed a Spanish trawler and its 36 crew members.

Spain's prime minister did little to deny paying off the hijackers – one reason the lucrative attacks are on the rise.

Somali Pirates Hijack Ship With North Korean Crew

2009-11-17T09:00:43Z

(AP)NAIROBI, Kenya - Pirates off the coast of Somalia have attacked two vessels, and at least one of those has been captured.

The European Union's anti-piracy force says pirates hijacked a chemical tanker on Monday named the MV Theresa with 28 North Koreans on board.

In a second incident, pirates attacked a Ukrainian cargo ship. Cmdr. John Harbour, a spokesman for the EU force, says that private security guards on board fired on the pirates, wounding two. Harbour says the Ukrainian ship was not hijacked.

A Somali man who claims to be a spokesman for the pirates, Gedi Ali, told The Associated Press on Tuesday that pirates had captured the Ukrainian ship. Ali also says two pirates were wounded in the attack

Coshocton: Single Illegal Download Shuts Down Town's Wi-Fi

2009-11-13T17:25:01Z

About five years ago, the county made a free wireless Internet connection available in the block surrounding the Coshocton County Courthouse at 318 Main St.

It was disabled last week after someone used the wireless local area network address to illegally download a movie.

UK Navy Watched As Pirates Took British Couple Hostage

2009-11-13T15:39:03Z

LONDON — The crew of a Royal Navy vessel watched as a British couple was abducted by Somali pirates, unable to rescue them without endangering their lives, the British military said Friday.

As armed pirates boarded Paul and Rachel Chandler's yacht on Oct. 23, the Royal Fleet Auxiliary replenishment tanker Wave Knight was within view, carrying light arms and a crew of 75 merchant seamen and 25 navy sailors in the Indian Ocean, the Ministry of Defense said.

UN: Illegal Music Sharers Should Not Be Jailed

2009-11-13T08:06:07Z

The heavy punishment of illegal file sharers on the web will be counter-productive in the global fight against Internet piracy and copyright infringement, the director-general of a United Nations agency said on Thursday.

Gary Shapiro: Dear FCC, Please Don't Let Hollywood Break My TV

2009-11-12T09:47:23Z

Four years ago, the motion picture industry convinced the Senate Judiciary Committee to hold a hearing to explore what Hollywood studios claimed was rampant piracy of movies occurring through the so-called "analog hole." (For non-engineers, the "analog hole" is the movie industry's term for any content-playing device connected to a TV through the red, blue and green multi-use port on the back of millions of TV sets.) The industry's trade group, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), argued that a great harm was devouring the motion picture industry: that consumers would export movies through the analog output, stealing content and sending it out over the Internet.

By the end of the hearing, Committee leaders did not appear convinced that such analog connections on TV sets were in fact leading to piracy. In fact, as the transcript of the hearing reveals, Committee Chairman Arlen Specter challenged the head of the MPAA, Dan Glickman, to provide evidence in support of the alleged problem:

Chairman Specter. Mr. Glickman, lots of information about piracy from you and from the Department of Justice, but can you quantify any direct connection between piracy and the analog hole?

Mr. Glickman. We have just completed a major study called the LE case study which estimates that our companies lose about $6.1 billion a year in piracy, and as part of that--

Chairman Specter. OK. I mean from analog--I have only got 5 minutes.

Mr. Glickman. OK, $1 to $1.5 billion in what we call noncommercial copying of movies for family and friends. We believe a big part of that is due to the analog hole.

Chairman Specter. How do you arrive at the figure of $1.5 billion?

Mr. Glickman. The firm did worldwide and national piracy study focus groups. The methodology we considered to be quite good.

Chairman Specter. Well, let me ask you to supplement your answer with the specifics as to how you come to that conclusion.

Mr. Glickman. Sure, be glad to.

Chairman Specter. We would like to see the methodology because before we really tackle the problem, we want to know--before we really look for a solution, we would like to have a specification of the problem.

Mr. Glickman. We will get you that, Senator.

And what of that methodology that MPAA's Glickman said was "quite good"? It turns out it wasn't quite so good. Rather than provide the evidence requested by Congress, the MPAA was forced to confess that due to "human error" they "got the math wrong" and were unable to properly quantify piracy "losses" from analog TV connections. Forced to admit the much-ballyhooed study exaggerated the losses due to piracy, the MPAA repudiated its own analysis.

Now, having failed to make its case to the Senate, the MPAA is back - this time, before the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) - asking permission to disable lawfully purchased HDTV-capable TVs. Using an obscure procedural mechanism, MPAA is asking the FCC for authority to use "selectable output control" (SOC) to shut off TVs that do not use the motion-picture industry's preferred digital connections. (Again for the non-engineers, SOC allows content providers to shut off the video stream to any TV that is receiving content over a non-favored connection, such as analog.)

The procedural vehicle may be different, but one thing remains the same - MPAA is still unable to show any evidence of piracy through analog outputs. That is because this type of piracy largely does not exist. Most movie piracy occurs before the studios release the movies on home video, much of it through the motion picture studios and their contractors - a fact that studios hide.

Indeed, some movie studio officials concede publicly that the biggest source of movie piracy is the old-fashioned video camera concealed by a movie patron under a coat. By the time a movie is being shown on cable TV, the file-sharing horse has left the barn. And so some forward-thinking studios, proving they don't agree with the industry's piracy argument, have begun releasing some films to video-on-demand even before DVD.

Given that at least some in Hollywood acknowledge their piracy argument makes no sense, why is the MPAA focusing its vast lobbying resources on this issue and trying to get the FCC to give them the right to shut off millions of TVs? The reason is that this is not about piracy, but about control of your TV. With the ability to turn off your TV at will, the studios gain veto power over TV design and the viewer's TV experience. If they are successful, viewers will only be able to watch movies when, where and how Hollywood says.

If the MPAA gets its way and the FCC grants its wish, then 25 million lawful TV viewers who rely on analog interfaces would be subject to being shut off by Hollywood. Millions of Americans could no longer be sure the technology they purchased in good faith would continue to be fully functional.

If the FCC grants Hollywood the power to turn off analog inputs soon they will return asking for permission to unilaterally disable other features and functions. This is bad for anyone thinking of buying a new product, or who bought something in the past thinking it would work a certain way.

As flimsy as Hollywood's case appears, don't underestimate the power of the MPAA. They are a Washington powerhouse, and they have retained a fleet of DC's top lobbyists to walk the halls of the Commission on this very issue.

This approach has paid off for MPAA in the past, but things may be different this time. The new FCC Chair has declared that this Commission's decisions would be guided by data, not which pleading industry had the most political heft.

Indeed, the FCC's new leader vowed to make this the most data-driven FCC in history. Now he faces his first test: a powerful, politically connected industry is asking for permission to inconvenience millions of consumers, without offering a shred of evidence that the result will reduce piracy.

We will soon learn whether the "new FCC" is a reality. We hope they understand that to take away the consumer's ability to shift lawfully acquired content based on the speculation and whims of the MPAA is bad policy. That is why every major consumer group is on record opposing it. That is why we oppose it.

Gary Shapiro is the president and CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association.

Pirates Threaten To Kill Spanish Captives

2009-11-06T16:03:08Z

MADRID Pirates on Friday threatened to kill three crew members of a Spanish fishing ship they seized over a month ago if two suspected pirates being held in Spain were not freed, according to news agencies who quoted the captain of the vessel.

UK Study: Illegal Music Downloaders Also Spend The Most On Music

2009-10-31T20:38:21Z

People who illegally download music from the internet also spend more money on music than anyone else, according to a new study.

Rachel Chandler: Pirates "Very Hospitable"

2009-10-30T12:30:09Z

MOGADISHU, Somalia — The BBC said Friday that Somali pirates called the broadcaster to demand $7 million for the release of a British couple whose yacht was hijacked off the coast of Africa.

The British broadcaster cited an unidentified caller as saying the size of the ransom was justified because NATO forces in the area had arrested Somali fishermen and destroyed their equipment.