The Justice Department’s Operation Higher Education, an investigation into software piracy online, has its first win, with three pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement for their involvement in “warez” (online piracy) groups such as Fairlight and Kalisto.
Seth Kleinberg of California is looking at a maximum ten years behind bars in the case, while Jeffrey Lerman of Maryland and Albert Bryndzda of New York each face up to five years behind bars, Justice announced March 9.
"Cybercrime and online piracy respect no boundaries," said U.S. Assistant Attorney General Christopher Wray in a statement announcing the pleas. "Operation Higher Education, and the broader Operation Fastlink, of which it is a significant part, are just another step in our increasingly global effort to target organized online piracy at all levels and around the world."
The three men pleaded guilty a day earlier, Kleinberg admitting to being a senior member of Fairlight and Kalisto who offered such services as supplying them with new software titles and helping to crack their coding as well as acting as a kind of courier distributing them to groups around the world.
Lerman pleaded to being a Kalisto ripper who manipulated code files of pirated computer games to fit games on single CD-ROMs to duck copy protection controls and simplify distribution of the pirated versions, Justice said, while Brynzda admitted to building and running two large servers tied to the Net for Fairlight and Kalisto storage and distribution.
For his part, Brynzda admitted to having built and operated two large servers that he, with the assistance of others, connected to the Internet for the use of members of the Fairlight and Kalisto groups to store and distribute thousands of titles of pirated software and other digital media.
