Pirate Bay founder sentenced for hacking, fraud

AP

STOCKHOLM (AP) — A founder of the popular file-sharing website Pirate Bay who was arrested in Cambodia under an international warrant was convicted in Sweden on Thursday of hacking and fraud and given a two-year prison sentence.

The Nacka District Court in Stockholm said 28-year-old Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, who is currently serving a one-year sentence for copyright violation, was found guilty of hacking into a company that handles sensitive information for Sweden's police force, the country's tax authority, and Nordic banking group Nordea AB. The court also convicted him of fraud and attempted fraud for stealing money from an account in Denmark and trying to illegally transfer euros 654,000 ($863,000) of money in European accounts.

Another Swede, Mathias Gustafsson, age 36, was found guilty of hacking and was placed on probation. It was not immediately clear if they would appeal.

"The data intrusion has been very extensive and technically advanced," the court said in its ruling.

The men denied wrongdoing, claiming their computers were used remotely by others, but computer forensic experts told the court they found evidence that the two men were behind the hacking.

In 2009, a Swedish court gave Svartholm Warg and three Pirate Bay colleagues one-year sentences for copyright violation. They also were ordered to pay 46 million kronor ($6.5 million) in damages to the entertainment industry.

Svartholm Warg appealed that ruling, but he left the country and was arrested in Cambodia in 2012, after Sweden issued an international arrest warrant for him. He was repatriated and his one-year prison sentence was upheld in an appeal court hearing last year.

Known by his Internet alias "Anakata," Svartholm Warg also is wanted in Denmark, where he is suspected of hacking to access sensitive information. During the Swedish investigation, police tipped off colleagues in neighboring Denmark who investigated and found traces of hacking of Danish sites, possibly by Svartholm Warg and a Dane.

The Danish Justice Ministry said the hackers had accessed "some information" from the Schengen Information System — a large European database maintained by police and legal officials — and had copied Danish social security numbers and data from the country's register of public and private businesses.

The Pirate Bay is one of the world's biggest free file-sharing websites, offering millions of users a forum for downloading music, movies and computer games.