Kim Dotcom, the internet entrepreneur fighting deportation from New Zealand to the United States on charges relating to his file-sharing website Megaupload, has suffered a “serious stroke”, a post on his X account said Monday.

“I have the best health professionals helping me to make a recovery. I will be back as soon as I can. Please be patient and pray for my family and I,” the post said.

Dotcom’s lawyer, Ira Rothken, confirmed to The Associated Press that the contents of the statement were accurate. Rothken would not say whether Dotcom or someone else wrote the post and did not provide further details.

  • ouch@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    I would suffer a stroke and more, too, if my country wanted to deport my ass to a third world country like the USA.

    • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      The legal process in USA is not trustworthy, it’s been shown time and again that USA punish people with extreme sentences to make an example of them. USA even tried to kidnap Kim Dotcom bypassing normal New Zealand procedure.

      I have no particular sympathies for Kim Dotcom, but the way USA behaves in cases of “national interest” is scary.
      Never forget Aaron Swartz! Who was driven to suicide, for copying data he had legal access to.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aaron_Swartz

      • NeoToasty@kbin.melroy.org
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        2 days ago

        Another great example - Edward Snowden.

        Does anyone really believe that the USA will ever…ever give him a fair trial for what he did? The guy was smart to flee the country. Ah yes, let’s give a fair trial to a guy that just jerked the curtain back to prove that yes, Americans are being spied on by the government. That’ll go nicely! /s

        • tekato@lemmy.world
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          Do you think government employees should be able to break NDAs and publish state secrets without consequences? I support what Snowden did, but he is now a criminal and must be prosecuted as such.

          • Uriel238 [all pronouns]@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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            1 day ago

            According to the US, torture is legal when it’s done by the US, which is a single example of how the federal US law does not reflect what is right, what is good, what is just.

          • CityPop@lemmy.today
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            Do you think government employees should be able to break NDAs and publish state secrets without consequences?

            When it comes to government transparency? Yes, undoubtedly.

            The criminals are those in government, but they own the system and will never go after themselves.

            • tekato@lemmy.world
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              When it comes to government transparency? Yes, undoubtedly.

              Yes, that’s why there are avenues for whistleblowers. Publicly sharing classified information is not one of them.

              The criminals are those in government, but they own the system and will never go after themselves.

              What’s the point of this statement? So because we can’t prosecute some criminals we shouldn’t prosecute anybody?

              • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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                1 day ago

                avenues for whistleblowers.

                He tried those first, and only after nothing happened doing that, did he go public.
                To stay silent about illegal activities is actually complicity. So in principle it would also have been illegal to stay silent!

          • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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            As a veteran, and former/ kinda current Captain, of the USN, yes. Provided that they fall under the protections for whistleblowers, which both Edward Snowden, and Chelsea Manning fell into rather neatly, according to US federal laws.

            Illegal orders are illegal. Even the UCMJ agrees with that stance.

            • tekato@lemmy.world
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              As a veteran, and former Captain, of the USN, yes.

              Yeah I’m sure you believe that. How many documents did you leak? You obviously didn’t use your security clearance to leak classified documents, which makes you a hypocrite. “Do as I say, not as I do”. Also, being a former captain doesn’t really make your opinion more valuable than anybody else’s.

              Provided that they fall under the protections for whistleblowers, which both Edward Snowden, and Chelsea Manning fell into rather neatly, according to US federal laws.

              Then you should know that publicly revealing classified information is not considered whistleblowing under the law. So I guess that changes your “Yes” to a “No”, since it was a “Yes” provided the statement that followed.

              Illegal orders are illegal. Even the UCMJ agrees with that stance.

              It looks like you’re not well informed on the subject. Snowden didn’t just say bad things were happening and that the US was spying on citizens (which would’ve still been illegal anyways). He stole 1.5 million classified documents, although he says that he hasn’t shared them.

              The truth is that whether you like it or not, Snowden is a criminal who knew what he was doing.

              • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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                I was a Navy Nuclear Power Program Electronics Technician Instructor. All the documents that I had access to were well known in the civilian zeitgeist before I was born.

                Snowden may have done something illegal, though my interpretation of both the UCMJ and Federal Whistleblower laws, as well as my recollection of what he released, says that you are a corporatist that is just salty that your favorite MIC corporation got outed for breaking federal laws.

                Manning didn’t break the law and still served an illegal sentence, so I will give Snowden and Asange the benefit of the doubt.

                I’m sick and tired of US propaganda, much less the international versions.

                Trump stole far more classified documents and that is just fine according to the law

                • tekato@lemmy.world
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                  18 hours ago

                  you are a corporatist that is just salty that your favorite MIC corporation got outed for breaking federal law

                  Provides nothing to the discussion but an insane reach (I already said I agree with what Snowden did) and an insult.

                  Manning didn’t break the law and still served an illegal sentence, so I will give Snowden and Asange the benefit of the doubt.

                  Here you are saying incorrect information again. I repeat, under the US law, leaking classified information to the public is not considered whistleblowing. Manning broke the law.

                  I’m sick and tired of US propaganda, much less the international versions.

                  I’m tired of all propaganda, including pro and anti-US propaganda. The US has enough issues as it is and there are enough reasons to condemn the current system. Making things up and defending criminal activities doesn’t help anybody.

                  Trump stole far more classified documents and that is just fine according to the law

                  Trump did not publicly leak any classified documents, he simply took them with him. It’s still illegal and was prosecuted for it, but this is not comparable to Manning or Snowden. By the way, Biden did the same thing.

          • NeoToasty@kbin.melroy.org
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            The American People deserve the knowledge of what their government is doing. For too long has the government operate in crooked practices that only have made the people grow contempt and distrustful towards.

            If the government is going to take, give back, take again and give back our rights while allowing itself to be influenced by corporate interests. It’s fair game.

            • tekato@lemmy.world
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              The American People deserve the knowledge of what their government is doing. For too long has the government operate in crooked practices that only have made the people grow contempt and distrustful towards.

              That is true, but unfortunately that’s not the law. It’s like smoking marihuana when it was illegal. Everyone knew it was harmless, but the law said to not smoke it so you shouldn’t. If you allow Snowden to break his confidentiality without consequences, you’re giving green light to everyone who wants to give classified information to foreign nations.

              If the government is going to take, give back, take again and give back our rights while allowing itself to be influenced by corporate interests. It’s fair game.

              But it’s not fair game. The fact that it’s the right thing to do is not related to the fact that it’s illegal. You can say that Snowden did the right thing and that he’s a criminal that deserves prosecution. Both of those things can be true at the same time, and they are.

              If you want to look for unjust prosecution, you look at Julian Assange’s case, not Snowden.

              • NeoToasty@kbin.melroy.org
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                I’d like for you to try and justify all of the times that the U.S Government has broken the law. Laws that they’ve made and international law, unapologetically. Also, you’re making some very weak comparisons. Snowden isn’t like Trump.

                • tekato@lemmy.world
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                  I’d like for you to try and justify all of the times that the U.S Government has broken the law. Laws that they’ve made and international law, unapologetically.

                  I never justify breaking the law. Everyone who breaks the law must be prosecuted and I never said otherwise. Unfortunately it’s hard to prosecute governments, specially from superpowers like the US.

                  Also, you’re making some very weak comparisons. Snowden isn’t like Trump.

                  At this point I believe you responded to the wrong person, because I also haven’t even mentioned Trump.

        • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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          Absolutely, why wasn’t she ever prosecuted? Why is it legal for a prosecutor to threaten to ruin peoples lives and put them to jail indefinitely?
          Basically all they had on him, was trespassing at the most!!

    • daddy32@lemmy.world
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      Oh come on. There are definitely some people that ruined many lives and - from a certain point of view - would deserve death, but he is not one of them.

      • ClusterBomb@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        He did ruin many lives tho. + he his a fascist crap 😬

        He litteraly had employees he told not to move to punish them if I remember right. And that is one of the most soft bad thing he did.

        • steeznson@lemmy.world
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          16 hours ago

          Wishing death upon someone because they are a libertarian (or hold whatever other opinion you disagree with) is trashy

        • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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          I have no love for KdC.

          I would like to see some sources there, as I remember him getting arrested, and as far as I remember, the worst he did was piracy, hosting of piracy, and potentially illegal dissemination of patents. Oh and possibly hosting some potentially illegal VPNs

          • SkaveRat@discuss.tchncs.de
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            15 hours ago

            He basically invented the whole “sueing people for illegal file sharing” industry together with his lawyer

            Fuck that guy

            • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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              Yeah, I understood that he was pretty scummy, even for a self professed “pirate,” it was the faschist accusation I wanted clarity on. I didn’t get any indication that the guy was interested in assisting any corporations, nor was he trying to help authoritarian ideologues.

              I may have totally missed the fascist part since I was far more interested in the pirate part. I personally don’t consider KdC to be an actual digital pirate, since he didn’t seem to give one single shit about the free flow of information.

              I also don’t consider him a nautical pirate since he seemed to be making far more booty than a ship’s charter would have allowed, and especially since he wasn’t sharing the booty with anyone at all, as far as I can tell. Pirates were some of the original “communist entrepreneurs,” AKA the original democratic co-op.

              It wasn’t pretty, but if someone like KdC became a pirate captain, his reign would be ended by his own crew. Probably spearheaded by the ship’s boatswain (accountant, pronounced like bōsn or bōsün), quartermaster, (the guy with the swords and guns in the armory, also the guy who makes the shift schedule with the boatswain’s recommendations), or the ship’s doctor who regularly knew how much food or medical supplies were left, and could easily recruit the ship’s cook into the “mutiny,” or change of command.

              KdC should have lost everyone that represented those keys to power within months of him setting up his scheme.

      • Realitaetsverlust@lemmy.zip
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        15 hours ago

        Nah that’s one of the chill ones.

        If you remove the tankie instances, blahaj.zone is probably the most toxic one.

      • viking
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        17 hours ago

        Had exactly the same thought. And it was so peaceful after blocking lemmygrad and .ml, I almost got used to it.

        Think I need to block their instance as well.