Tech savvy fans here must already have heard about the leakage of an iPhone 4g by the famous technology blog Gizmodo – However a police raid at the house of a Gizmodo editor was one thing we expected the least but it has happened! The house of Jason Chen, was forced to welcome the men of California’s Rapid Enforcement Allied Computer Team.
The guys of Rapid Enforcement Allied Computer Team had a warrant issued by a San Mateo judge to raid and confiscate materials at the blog editor’s place for leaking a “rather secret” model of iPhone being developed by Apple.
Recap of the small story: iPhone 4g is one of the most awaited piece of tech drug and its design and other aspects are top secret information of Apple only. However and somehow a model of the unreleased phone was found in a bar (apparently lost by an Apple employee). The person who found the phone then sold it to Gizmodo for about $5000.Apples asked that the phone is returned to them, and Gizmodo even accepted to do it. However, the house of the editor Jason Chen was raided and 4 pc along with 2 servers were seized.
The question we ask ourselves here is with what right can a company force and use the law to acquire something someone bought (even though it was lost – NOT STOLEN!). Well while we find this weird here, the Californian law however states:
One who finds lost property under circumstances which give him knowledge of or means of inquiry as to the true owner, and who appropriates such property to his own use, or to the use of another person not entitled thereto, without first making reasonable and just efforts to find the owner and to restore the property to him, is guilty of theft.
Well! Anyway, Gizmodo made a real profit with this leakage too. They bought it at $5000 and got over 100 million views in some days only on their blog! So assuming a mere $2 CPM for advertising they display on their site, that’s around $200000 money earned for just mentioning about this device. Nice isn’t it?