One of the biggest hits on the Scene (The Scene) was made on June 29, 2005.
It was a worldwide coordinated action initiated by the FBI. A total of three separate undercover investigations were carried out which culminated in the so-called “Operation Site Down".
The researchers were able to locate more than 120 sites in the US, Canada, Portugal, France, Belgium, Israel, Denmark, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Germany and Australia and conducted more than 90 raids across the world, arresting many people.
The list of release groups that were "hit" was particularly long. There were the release groups RiSCiSO, Myth, The Divine Alcoholics, Legends Never Die, Goodfellaz, HOODLUM, VENGEANCE, Centropy, WastedTime, PARANOiD, Corrupt, Gamerz, AdmitONE, Hellbound, KGS, BLaCKBoX, Kurou Haku Goraku, NOX, Third Party, ConsoleDupeZ , The Underground Network, Bong Hit Productions, and Not For Resale.
How the FBI was infiltrated
He managed to "pass" an agent in the Scene, who had managed to approach people from the inside for many months under the alias "Griffen". Recently, he had even taken over the site op of two servers named CHUD and LAD. Both Top sites were used to record what was happening in The Scene, while the FBI was recording all data movements in the background. When the officials were able to gather enough information, they stormed in.
SCENENOTICE internal information on arrests
A hard blow for the pirate film release groups of the time was the arrest of Release Group Centropy. Centropy were at the time arguably one of the top groups in the scene as they managed to release pirated films before they were even released in cinemas.
However, a day after Centropy was captured, the movie “Herbie: Fully Loaded” was released with the following NFO mocking the pursuers.
So Operation Site Down couldn't bring The Scene to its knees. To date, none of the operations carried out by the FBI or other law enforcement agencies have been able to stop the work of release groups in the long term.
Authorities have been successful in sentencing members of the Scene to lengthy prison terms. Also, many of the members of the specific groups announced their departure leaving the Scene.
But these Authority hits usually hit individual members, never the scene as a whole. They do not seem to have a deterrent effect, as the desire for the "glory" of releasing a pirated app - game - movie seems to be greater than the fear of imprisonment.
The members of the Scene know the danger and hope they are not among those arrested next time.
Often the arrests are even an additional motivation for the Scene. New release groups try to fill the resulting gaps and continue the work of the big groups.
Others simply see an opportunity to quickly make a name for themselves after successful teams disappear. We should mention that sometimes the mandatory resignations of release groups they are short-lived. Many well-known groups announce their comeback after a while, and others use the resignation as a camouflage in order to stay in the scene. with a new name.
Prosecutors, on the other hand, report that The Scene's activities are greatly reduced after each crackdown by the authorities.
However, after a few weeks, the Tent reorganizes and strengthens its security measures. Today, is still active after more than thirty years and despite all police investigations.
