By Cavan Sieczkowski: Subscribe to Cavan's RSS feed
January 20, 2012 11:05 AM EST
Kim Schmitz, founder of Megaupload and otherwise known by his alias "Kim Dotcom," was arrested by the Department of Justice Thursday, for content piracy and losses to copyright owners that amount to $500 million. Schmitz was found by police in his New Zealand mansion's safe room, with what looked like a sawed-off shotgun Detective Inspector Grant Wormald said.
''It was definitely not as simple as knocking at the front door.''
Megaupload was founded in 2005. The site was based on file-sharing content, including movies, television shows and e-books. Megaupload was one of the Internet's most popular Web sites with claims of over one billion users. At one point, it was ranked the No. 13 most-frequented site on the Internet, according to the indictment. The site claims to have approximately 50 million daily visitors.
Federal authorities claimed that Megaupload executives, including Schmitz who reportedly owned a 68 percent stake, made $175 million from user subscription fees and online ads. Authorities said the Web site robbed authors, movie producers, musicians and other copyright holders of more than $500 million, according to The Washington Post.
Life of Luxury
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Who exactly is Kim Schmitz? Schmitz is a 37-year-old German national who holds Finnish citizenship and has homes in Hong Kong and New Zealand, according to the Global Post. According to the FBI's indictment, the former hacker made $42 million from Megaupload and its associated Web sites including Megavideo, Megalive and Megapix.
Schmitz was found in the safe room of his New Zealand mansion. He lives in New Zealand's most expensive home, according to The Sydney Morning Herald - a $23 million mansion in Coatesville, north of Auckland, formerly owned by the founders of the Chrisco Christmas hampers empire.
Police raided the home to carry out 10 search warrants. They seized a total of 18 luxury vehicles, including Rolls-Royce Phantom Drophead Coupe and a 1959 pink Cadillac. He also had a 2012 Maserati and numerous Mercedes Benz vehicles.
The license plates on the vehicles were interesting unto themselves. They read: "GOD" (Rolls-Royce Phantom Drop Head Coupe), "MAFIA" (Mercedes-Benz ML63 AMG), "STONED" (Mercedes-Benz E63 AMG), "GOOD" & "EVIL" (Mercedes-Benz ML63 AMG).
Click here to view photos of his mansion and the various cars being seized.
Police also froze up to $8 million in various New Zealand bank accounts Schmitz claimed. According to The Wall Street Journal, "the U.S. is moving to seize a great deal of property, including $175 million, or as much of that as they can find, and the funds in dozens of bank accounts" of Megaupload executives.
Not His First Breach with the Law
The Megaupload takedown was not Kim Schmitz's first breach with the law. His list of convictions date back years and include inside trading, credit-card fraud, hacking and embezzlement.
Schmitz was also the mastermind who cracked the systems of banks and governments, including Citibank and the Pentagon. He then fled to Thailand to avoid indictment in Germany, Deutsche Presse-Agentur reported. In 2002, Schmitz was deported from Thailand to Germany on charges of insider trading and fraud, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.
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