As reported by Elliotsblog.com, AVN.com and Xbiznewswire.com, the offices of National A-1 located in Philadelphia, were raided today by “more than 100 law enforcement agents from the FBI and local police.”
National A-1 operates some adult sites, including HotMovies.com and GayMovies.com.
According to the articles, “the FBI agents were armed with search warrants and more than 100 employees were detained and later released”
However let me remind everyone that its still innocent until proven guilty, and according to the AVN article no one has even been arrested and no charges have been filed.
One can only assume, and its a true assumption that 2253 issues maybe at play.
Federal law place a heavy record keeping requirement on producers and distributors of adult material.
“No one is in custody,” Klaver said. “There have been no [federal] indictments filed.”
Why take 3 guys when you waste the time of 100?
James
The feds do this as a show of force many times
Very early, lets see where this goes if anywhere
Gotta be serious if they rolled in 100 deep… Heh 🙁
Let’s hope they are 2257 compliant.
Most likely it has to do with 2257 record keeping. The Feds are so stringent about this, that I was told by an attorney that if your records are not filed correctly, meaning in the wrong filing cabinet on premises no less, they will fine you a hefty fee. Anyone doing business in the adult entertainment industry would be wise to have their 2257 records stored at an attorneys office.
A week before election day, too. Democrats have to show they’re tough on porn, because….um, well, anyone who cares about this is already voting Republican, no?
Anyone operating adult in the US is a ‘risk taker’ to say the least.
Go offshore or don’t even bother.
As far as them using 100 people to execute a warrant where no indictments have even been filed, that’s what Feds do. They’re like a street gang, only with government authority. They’re not out to do ‘what’s right’.
The greatest offender to Federal regulatory agencies is a small operator who makes lots and lots of money. The agents who run these sideshow investigations, the ones who initiate and sign off on everything, are civil servants who make a ‘moderately decent’ income. If you’re making a lot of money, they’re going to do everything in their power to screw with you. To a man, they’re people who probably couldn’t achieve much success on their own, and compensate for this by screwing with people who have. This is why ‘law enforcement’ is the only job for them. This sentiment has been playing itself out since the days of the Roman Empire and unfortunately, a couple thousand years later, we still haven’t found a way to prevent jealous, petty people from becoming cops and abusing that authority.
– Someone who’s danced this dance before.
@T. Lassiter Jones
You got to like a guy with a great since of humor – I am with you….
@Anon
I believe those words apply to parking ticket gestapo agents as well – thanks for the laugh
There are some distributors of adult media that seem exempt from keeping 2257 Documents
Pirate sites that publish stolen adult media. Share sites that distribute adult media.
Both type of sites feel that they should enjoy adult media for free because they are smart and those produce adult media are filthy rich and can afford to produce adult media for free for them
WHY DO THE FEDS IGNORE PIRATES AND SHARE SITES THAT DISTRIBUTE ADULT ND MAYBE EVEN CHILDREN MEDIA WITH NO DOCUMENTATION. WHY IT IS OK TO STEAL ADULT MEDIA?
“more than 100 law enforcement agents from the FBI and local police.”
They must have been expecting something really big to go in with that many people….either that or they just like wasting money.
“No one is in custody,” Klaver said. “There have been no [federal] indictments filed.”
—–
Someone will be, FBI doesn’t like to be embarrassed by being proven wrong. They will charge you with crimes with a 18,000 year maximum sentence, but if you plead, you get 5 and a gazillion in fines
Having worked there… I believe it has something to do with the filtering process. They accept any material sent whether it comes from vivid or the toothless crack whore in kensington. There have incidents of material accepted, that did not get published on the website itself, featuring children and other items illegal in the US… I suspect this is the issue. And it may end up as a lot more than liberal showcasing… Then again, they’ve been around for a while, so maybe not.
Lila
Pirated material is a entirely different issue.
With regard to 2257 record keeping of course the only one’s that have to comply are those companies and individuals doing business in the US.
Many adult sites are owned by companies located outside the US.
Are they the same as pizza.com?
Domo
National A-1 owns Pizza.com as well as a ton of great non-adult domains
Thanks.
Looks like the winners of the “we get it” award at TRAFFIC really did “get it”
@ GG
Look at the case of Landslide Productions- who were nothing more than content intermediaries. The operator of that, Thomas Reedey, was sentenced to over 1000 years (one thousand years) in prison because a content provider in Southeast Asia was using his ‘affiliate sites’ to sell child pornography, even though he reported the sites to the FBI. He will never breathe a day of free air again and he was not a content producer.
Really, as unacceptable as underaged/child pornography is, it’s rapidly evolving into a witch-hunt sort of thing by moral crusaders who use it as a pretext to attack otherwise lawful adult content.
We expend thousands of man-hours and millions of dollars to pursue parties only marginally involved with images that are often times very, very old and in no way represent ongoing abuse of children (a computer forensics guy I know talked about a conference he went to and how a law enforcement official who is tasked with child pornography cases said 90% of the images he pulls up in an active case, he’s already familiar with from past cases and that ‘new images’ are quite uncommon and acted upon very, very quickly by the Feds, Interpol, etc)
Back in the day, adult was so, so lucrative, but I’m glad I never got involved with that mongoose in a bag. The whole “is she really 18?” thing just struck me as being too gushy and loosely defined.
It had nothing to do with 2257 compliances or the movies sites. National also owns Escorts.com and that was the site in question for the raid.
@Anon:
I’m not saying whether any of it is right or wrong… I am saying that it may be the issue. Also, as an added note, this is not a matter of “is” “she” “really” “18”, I separate those words, because each one of them makes an assumption that does not even begin to hit on the breadth of the content I speak of. I only commented because I worked for the site for over a year, and I couldn’t take it anymore. I would not be surprised if someone else left the place and whether by incident or design set this sort of thing in motion…as you pointed out there are some hot button issue like CHILDREN – again- CHILDREN NOT EVEN CLOSE TO 18 MALE AND FEMALE- that spark the passions of many, and demand redress.
Just saying, I don’t know if you understand what “Nudist Family Camping Trip” is, as it was made in a low budget local way, not overseas, and featured a family… toddler and all. So, be careful what you defend…
http://www.hotmovies.com/2257.php
“2257 compliance
National A-1 Internet, Inc. & HotMovies.com does not produce any content and makes no representation about any content. All video products offered on this site have been licensed from their respective studios or producers (the “Licensor”).
National Internet Service is not in possession of any original 2257 disclaimers for any of the models; however, all of the Licensors that provide content licensed to National Internet Service represent that all models appearing in their productions are over 18 and that the Licensor maintains all appropriate 2257 disclaimers or the equivalent.”
Well that could be the issue… I mean, maybe they are trying to look into one of their models, and since they say they have no such paperwork, they are the target…
note that John Rollins reporting for Action News channel 6 (followed link to video from Ricks blog) said that, quote, “.. but today IRS agents and FBI agents have been, have basically been here all day …”
if the issue was solely with the above adult record keeping statutes in question, why would IRS agents be involved? I would have to guess financial records are also being seized
What is the true number as to porn traffic on the web?
This is all about the Witch Hunt against consenting adults. The FBI refused to show the manager the warrant which is illegal. Escort.com is not required to comply with 2253 because they are not sending images online. Even porn companys that need to ahear to the 2253 means they have to keep all the model contracts on site and be open during office hours, they can’t be kept an an attorney’s office.
The general attorneys office took Craiglist to court and the court ruled that they could not shut down adult sites because escorting is legal and there are some legit providers out there. So then they used the media to lie about all these human trafficking cases and yet the adovocates only want to keep us criminalized, they collect donatins for VICTIMS and spend the money touring the country lying to the media. Craiglist closed volunteerly because they were tired of being harassed.
Right now nationwide they are doing raids on massage palors and some of these busy bodies are looking for adult ads that say grand opening and then calling the cops demanding they investigate. In PA there is a crazy lady that says all nail salons are massage palors ad should be shut down too.
The saddest part is that this takes away the same sanction and protection given to everyone else and puts these women in harms way. We have the police chief in PA that engaged in sex with 13 women and then arreted them, or the cops that pimped out a 17 year old and plead guilty and only got 11 years or the Boston cop that threatened hookers with pending cases into having sex right in the court house with 3 women and he was not charged with a felony and they jury said these women were not harmed.
Why we allow Hate crimes against any adult provider is wrong, we hear the cops tell the media we will continue to run these women from our communites. Meanwhile law enforcment no longer has the cooperationof craiglist to get the IP addresses of the pimps exploiting our teens. Some of the cops are bragging that they have the client books, which proves nothing and it not enough to prosecute, do they think the women the just arrested will testify against the client. With the behavior of the cops is is much more like a predator or bully, who violates peoples civil rights even during arrest with threats and lies.
Ironically when they raid a massage spa they only use a few officers but when they arrest a middle aged women from her home they use the SWAT TEAM to kick in her door and then only give her a summons to appear in court.
It election day tell your local rep you don’t want yor tax dollars being spent on a witch hunt that harms the victims,and makes it pubicly ok for Hate Crimes against escorts.
Every town has hookers crawling down the streets so maybe they should clean that mess up and leave consenting adults alone who meet in private.
In canada 300 hookers were murdered within 20 years before they started investigating and they throw all there laws out that decriminated a escort and criminalized them, because it harms the women who are the victims We need to sperate exploiting kids FROM consenting adults who meet in private. seperate governement from religion, these moral laws are based on religion not law. Originally prostitution lws were created to “stop a women from showing her wares in public” there was no mention of MORALS
meanwhile we set up no services for women wanting to exit the indsutry and we just expect them all to become homeless and live in the street and be subjected to more rape and violence.
Sweden found compassion for escorts and selling sex was decriminalzed but buying sex is still illegal and they can throw Johns and PIMPs in jail, human trafficking went down and no more women entered the industry.
I thnk it is high time the USA found some compassion for women living in poverty in the worst recesion of the century.
I pose again the same unanswered question. Some people answered by dismissing the question.
Why share sites, like rapidshare, who distribute adult media without knowledge or consent from the owners are not prosecuted for violating Title 18 section 2257 . That law requires sites who distribute adult media to have documented proof that people in the media are adults
This shares sites cause damage to adult website by depriving them of revenue and making them spend time chasing such sites and request them to remove the media. many time the media reappears after they removed it.
Do the Feds avoid prosecuting them because they cause damage to adult sites?
LILA SOVIESTSKAYA
i want you to know that this company stole 44.00 dollars from me for a bougus shit and i want my money back