Kim Dotcom has poked fun at his arrest last year by staging a fake Police raid as part of the launch for his new business venture.
Dotcom – aka Kim Schmitz – launched Mega at his mansion just outside of Auckland, New Zealand in front of 200 guests. The event took place a year to the day where he was snooped on by Federal Police at the exact same location over his now-defunct file-sharing service, Megaupload.
NME reports the launch featured a re-enactment of 2012’s police raid, with men scaling the sides of the house and a mock FBI helicopter zooming over the crowd. The launch was soundtracked by traditional live Maori music from local artists.
More than a million people are believed to have already signed up for Mega – which is offering users 50GB of free online storage space. Doctom believes the service is perfectly legal and will not run into any of the problems which led to the demise of Megaupload.
“Legally, there’s just nothing there that could be used to shut us down. This site is just as legitimate and has the right to exist as Dropbox, Boxnet and other competitors,” he said.
And according to The Next Web, Doctom also said he plans to create hundreds of jobs to support the roll-out and expansion of Mega – and re-hire old employees affected by Megaupload’s demise.
“Megaupload had 220 employees worldwide when shut down. These guys lost their jobs when shut down without payment. We are going to rehire all of those who want to come back to us. We plan to make a few hundred jobs in New Zealand,” he said.
Dotcom is still waiting to hear if he and three colleagues will be extradited from New Zealand to the United States over last year’s raid. At the time, he was charged with operating a criminal enterprise that distributes intellectual property (Megaupload), and had two firearms and a number of cars seized from the mansion. If convicted, he’ll face up to 20 years in jail.
