Australian police swoop on Warez community

The early morning raids, on homes in Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide, are part of a global investigation dubbed 'Operation Buccaneer' which saw the US Customs execute 37 search warrants in 27 US cities, according to a US Customs statement.

-Seven search warrants were executed in Australia in the early hours of the morning," an Australian Federal Police (AFP) spokesperson told ZDNet Australia. However, -there have been no arrests or charges coming out of that yet," she added.

The AFP said the investigation was ongoing and that an amount of evidence had been seized and information gathered which would be passed on to the US Customs service, -with a view to prosecution".

The coordinated international raids, which fall on the back of a fifteen-month undercover investigation, spanned the US, United Kingdom, Canada, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Germany, as well as Australia, with a total of 60 search warrants executed in all

US Customs said four individuals have been arrested in connection with the case so far.

"Operation Buccaneer is the largest and most extensive investigation of its kind," US Customs Commissioner Robert Bonner said in a statement. "This investigation underscores the severity and scope of a multi-billion-dollar software swindle over the Internet, as well as the vulnerabilities of this technology to outside attack."

According to US Customs, the initial phase of the investigation focused primarily on the Warez group called DrinkOrDie, the most well known of about ten major Internet piracy groups.

As Warez members include corporate executives, computer network administrators and students at major universities, government workers, and employees of large-scale technology and computer firms, computers and hard drives were seized following the execution of search warrants on major universities, businesses, as well as residential US addresses, US Customs said.

The software pirated by the groups under investigation included expensive business software, firewall and other security software, and copyrighted games, music and digital videos.