Film sites fined for fraud

Interesting article from Variety about some vile sites that stuck software on user's computers then forced them to pay to have it removed. I'm wondering why the owners weren't charged with the same sorts of crimes that people who release viruses are charged with since the end result is pretty much the same.

Instead they've been fined about half a million dollars, although that number isn't set in stone and could go up to nearly two million.

According to court papers the FTC filed a year ago, operators of Movieland.com, Moviepass.tv and Popcorn.net surreptitiously downloaded onto consumers' computers "software that repeatedly disrupted computer use with a sequence of large pop-ups, accompanied by music that lasted nearly a minute and could not be closed or minimized."

The pop-ups "demanded that consumers pay the (operators) as much as $99.00 to end the recurring pop-up cycle, claiming that consumers had signed up for a three-day 'free trial' to use the (operators') Internet download services and had not cancelled their 'license' before the trial period ended," the FTC charged.

When computer owners tried to remove or uninstall the pop-ups, they were automatically directed to a website informing them that they had to pay a fee in order to stop the pop-ups. Some people paid the fee out of frustration; others paid a computer technician to remove the software.