Matthew David Howard Smith, the founder of defunct content-sharing site NinjaVideo, pleaded guilty in a Virginia court to one count of criminal copyright infringement and one count conspiracy to commit the same announced U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Friday.
The 23-year old North Carolina native owned up to designing key aspects of the site's infrastructure in 2008 and then striking a lucrative deal with unnamed online advertisers. The arrangement turned NinjaVideo into a cash cow for both him and four other recently indicted suspects. Smith told the court that the band of pirates racked up around $500,000 in less than three years.
ICE said NinjaVideo's closure in 2010 was part of the initial wave of its aggressive "Operation In Our Sites" anti-piracy campaign. The site still bears the telltale seizure notice.
Dedicated to rooting out illegal web content, the joint effort between ICE and the Department of Homeland Security came under fire in February from Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) over possible First Amendment violations. Sen. Wyden wrote ICE Director John Morton, questioning the groups' domain seizures and whether or not they were operating in accordance with the law.
In another anti-cyber crime initiative, ICE and the DHS launched "Operation Protect Our Children" - a noble mission to shut down online child pornographers. One botched attempt resulted in a domain seizure that took around 84,000 sites offline. The vast majority of the affected sites were just collateral damage. ICE later admitted the sites were "inadvertently seized" and restored them.
Kevin Suh, MPAA Senior Vice President of Internet Content Protection, was satisfied with the news. Writing about the guilty plea at the official MPAA blog, Suh applauded the efforts of ICE investigators.
"NinjaVideo was a prime example of these 'worst of the worst' rogue websites that victimize not only the buyers of these products, but the over 2 million hardworking Americans whose livelihoods depend on the motion picture and television industry," he wrote.
Smith's sentencing hearing is scheduled for December 16th, 2011. He faces up to 10 years in prison, said ICE. His cohorts will have their day in court on February 6th, 2012.
