On the way into work this morning, I was delighted to read that Andrew Crossley of ACS:LAW has thrown in the towel and wont be trying to hussle money from innocent people any longer.
For those unaware of the history, Crossley’s firm targeted alleged file sharers and demanded hundreds, sometimes thousands, in exchange for not taking them to court. His “evidence” was nothing more than an IP address collected from a torrent swarm by a third party company, something which his own counsel expressed concerns over. None-the-less, Crossley continued his venture until he came to the attention of Anonymous.
The ACS:LAW website was soon experiencing a DDoS attack and they made the situation much worse when they restored the site, inadvertently exposing a backup of the firm’s mailserver at the same time. All emails soon became public and their contents made headlines, primarily focused on the underhanded extortion racket effectively in operation.
Fast-forward a few months and we get to today’s news
“A patent court in London had been hearing the cases of 26 of the alleged file sharers but Mr Crossley has now ended his involvement.
In a statement read to the court, he said:‘I have ceased my work… I have been subject to criminal attack.”
Goodbye, Crossley. You wont be missed by many.
