Exposing skin is pretty distant from what MegaUpload was accused of. (The validity of the charges is another matter, I just REALLY don't think it is correct to compare this to not pulling your hijab down far enough)
From my point of view, American copyright and patent laws are very, very wrong. They largely miss their intended purposes. What's more, apparently even non-Americans on the other side of the world are at risk of being the target of these legal shenanigans.
I cannot stress how RIDICULOUS I think this whole affair is.
It's as if the prosecutors figure that Megaupload operates on the Internet, therefore it's operating in America and is subject to American law... is this another example of people who do not understand how the Internet works making major decisions about the Internet and it's future?
Consider a homeless person who had stolen money and kept it in a bank. Just because the government can't find the alleged thief and doesn't have an address for them shouldn't mean they can't freeze the account, allowing the thief to go on making withdrawls at ATMs around the world.
However your analogy assumes that the homeless person (Megaupload) is guilty of theft and lives in the U.S.
If this homeless person lives in another country and someone in America claims that this homeless person stole from them. Does the U.S. government even have the right to go and seize this homeless person's foreign assets?
Everyone seems to be conveniently forgetting that Megaupload has NOTHING to do with the United Stated except for operating on the Internet and not discriminating against U.S. customers.
I suppose it would depend on the treaties with have with where those assets are held.
Also freeze =/= seize. They are similar and rhyme but not identical.
"Everyone seems to be conveniently forgetting that Megaupload has NOTHING to do with the United Stated except for operating on the Internet and not discriminating against U.S. customers."
Are you telling me that I can sit in Nowhereistan, hack into bank accounts all over the world to steal that money, transfer it into my Nowhereistan accounts and I'm immune to all the world's governments even though they have a treaty with Nowhereistan?
if you try and use your money to travel out of Nowhereistan, then we got you, but so long as you haven't broken the laws of your own country, and you stay in your own country, you absolutely should be immune.
What other approach would make sense? Should you be able to be arrested in the US for acting contrary to laws passed in Pakistan?
Now an internet company with customers around the world is different - but not so different that this should be possible under criminal law without a very clear pre-written law.
Violating religious law vs violating the property of private corporations?
In both cases it's just law, enacted and enforced by the government of each country.