Dotcom: Key lied; GCSB planted cameras

Kim Dotcom claims John Key has lied about when he first learnt of him and will prove it in court.

The Prime Minister has repeatedly denied having known about Mr Dotcom before the police raid.

“He [John Key] is running naked and telling people he has clothes on. Everyone can see he’s naked… I know for a fact that John Key knew before January 19, and it’s going to be a topic in our court hearing,” Mr Dotcom said on TVNZ's Q+A. 

“If we can show that the government he has had an active role in the magnitude of this whole case and had a proactive role rather than a reactive role to impress the United States Government, well, you know, there you have it.”

Mr Dotcom heading back in the High Court on November 22, when Senior Queen's Counsel Stuart Grieve will report on his investigation into the GCSB's role in the case.

“We know that they [the GCSB] have spied on us more than is already known. I mean, they have installed cameras around the property. They have surveilled us quite a bit, so all of that will have to come out during the court proceedings," he told Q+A interviewer Paul Holmes.

Earlier, during a session on his Pacific Cable plans, he told NBR's Chris Keall that more GCSB revelations were on the way. "They didn’t just listen to our phone calls, they installed cameras. This was a full-on spy operation," Mr Dotcom said.

"All the details will come out and every New Zealander will be totally disgusted. People will be more fearful now. They [the GCSB] totally abused their power. It’s a good thing this is coming out [at the November 22 High Court hearing."

However, when Mr Keall called a senior member of Mr Dotcom's legal team for comment on the claim, he poured cold water on it.

Simpson Grierson partner William Akel told NBR he was not aware of any video surveillance by the GCSB. It was possible that two events - legal police video and audio surveillance and illegal GCSB audio surveillance were being confused.

Not sue NZ
Mr Dotcom said he would not seek damages from the New Zealand Government over the police raid, but has targets in the US should he win.

“If I would seek damages, I would not seek them in New Zealand. I would seek them from the US Government, which has acted in bad faith, and I would seek that also from Hollywood Studios.”

The accused pirate also returned to the John Bank donation controversy. He said the former super city mayoral candidate asked him for two cheques in person after he offered to donate $50,000 to his campaign.

Mr Banks “got himself into trouble by not being perfectly honest”, Mr Dotcom said, but added “I still think he is a good guy.”

Mr Dotcom asked Banks to help him get a thicker mattress because of back pain he was experiencing in prison and was “hurt” Banks wouldn’t help.

He also being an internet pirate, making millions from other people’s copyrighted material.

"The bottom line is if Megaupload is illegal, so is YouTube, so are countless other sites that allow user-generated content,” he said.

“If you go to YouTube now, right now, and you look for infringing material, you will find more there online right now than you would ever find in the history of Megaupload. It’s the reality of the internet.

“It’s not my responsibility to stop them [customers uploading copyright infringing files]. I was an online service provider. It’s not my job to police what people are uploading.”

“I think copyright has its right to exist, absolutely, and I think that it’s up to copyright creators to come up with new solutions that deal with the reality of the world we’re living in today."

He added, "Not a penny has been paid to anybody who’s uploading a full-length movie." (Megaupload's financial rewards were based around a points system.)

Mr Dotcom’s frozen assets are having an impact: “We have a lot of outstanding expenses, you know, where creditors are lining up because they haven’t been paid,” he said.

Remaining staff have taken a pay cut: “This property [Dotcom Mansion] had 50 people. We’re now down to eight.”

Mr Dotcom also denied pushing video editor Jesse Bushyhead and cancelling his air ticket, as discussed in last weekend’s Sunday programme.

“I’m not a violent guy. I never push anybody. I don’t hurt anybody,” he said.

RAW DATA:  

Watch part one of Kim Dotcom's interview here and part two here.

Q+A TRANSCRIPT

PAUL HOLMES INTERVIEWS KIM DOTCOM

PAUL HOLMES: So, how much support do you get from New Zealanders, like, round the country, wherever you go?

KIM DOTCOM - Internet Entrepreneur  If I go out in the car, for example, I drive to the police station to report that I’m still here, people will wave or give me thumbs up or honk. And it’s just, you know, very friendly.

HOLMES      Do you have to go to the police station and say you’re still here?

DOTCOM     Yeah.

HOLMES      How often do you do that?

DOTCOM     Well, it used to be three times a week. That has been reduced now.

HOLMES      Ok. What is your situation? Are you without money?

DOTCOM     Yes. Well, funds have been frozen. So all around the world, our assets have been frozen. We have been given some allowance by the court for living expenses and recently for rent.

HOLMES      How much money were you used to? How much money did you have?

DOTCOM     Well, I was in a situation where you didn’t really have to think about that, you know? Whatever you need, you could afford.

HOLMES      Are you able to pay the bills? Or are you getting behind in the bills?

DOTCOM     Well, it’s really difficult. We have a lot of outstanding expenses, you know, where creditors are lining up because they haven’t been paid.

HOLMES      Can you pay your staff?

DOTCOM     Very limited compared to what we used to pay them, but they are all taking a cut, and we have reduced our staff here significantly. I mean, this property had 50 people. We’re now down to eight.

HOLMES      Has this whole experience put you off New Zealand at all?

DOTCOM     Well, you know, in the beginning, certainly, but, I mean, the good thing that came out of all this negativity was really that New Zealand kind of embraced us now, and we are welcome here. So, you know, it definitely makes us feel more home than before, which is odd because of the situation.

HOLMES      Was that freaky, that whole police invasion?

DOTCOM     It was a total disaster. I mean, you know, shocking for Mona, especially. I mean, if you’re pregnant with twins and you already have to deal with all kinds of pains and issues because of such a pregnancy and then you’re put under the stress, and she is separated from the kids. You know, she has to stand outside in the rain on the grass, and no one is attending to her when she wanted to go to the hospital because she had, you know, contractions from the shock. The police wouldn’t do anything.

HOLMES      Does your wife still have the nightmares?

DOTCOM     Yeah.

HOLMES      Really?

DOTCOM     Well, I mean, if you are in a situation like that, that’s something that stays with you for some time. And you have to understand, we’re living in a house that still has all the marks, all the scarring of what happened here. You know, boot prints on the walls, knocked in doors, marks of the sledgehammers, smashed in walls. That stuff is still here.

HOLMES      If they’d knocked on the door, the police, would you have answered?

DOTCOM     Of course. There’s absolutely no reason why they have to arrive here in helicopters with the amount of people and dogs and all of that. I’m a peaceful guy. I’m not somebody who is any threat to anybody. I’ve never hurt anybody.

HOLMES      Were there many guns?

DOTCOM     Well, the security guard has put two guns on the property - one in his quarters and one up in the safe room.

HOLMES      Did your security people get their guns?

DOTCOM     No.

HOLMES      No?

DOTCOM     No.

HOLMES      So there was no armed confrontation, nothing like this?

DOTCOM     Nothing like that. No, what would never have been the case.

HOLMES      Are there going to be some more shocks?

DOTCOM     What do you mean by shocks?

HOLMES      Spy shocks.

DOTCOM     Spy shocks? Well, we know that they have spied on us more than is already known. I mean, they have installed cameras around the property. They have surveilled us quite a bit, so all of that will have to come out during the court proceedings.

HOLMES      Where do you come from, Kim Dotcom?

DOTCOM     Well, originally I’m born in Germany.

HOLMES      What part? In the north?

DOTCOM     In northern Germany. In Kiel.

HOLMES      Kiel?

DOTCOM     Mm-hm, which is close to Hamburg. So spent most of my young childhood in northern Germany and then parts in Finland because my mother is from Finland. So I’m also a Finnish citizen, and I spent time in, you know, Turku.

HOLMES      I see you have the Finnish flag flying today.

DOTCOM     Yeah, that’s right.

HOLMES      What did your mother and father-? So, you say your mother was Finnish.

DOTCOM     Yes.

HOLMES      So, what did your mother and father do?

DOTCOM     Well, my mother was a housewife. She learnt to be a cook. And my father was an engineer on a ship, a cruise liner.

HOLMES      Did they understand you?

DOTCOM     I guess I’m certainly living in my own space, and the internet is something that is not as, you know, as interesting to them as it is to me. So I wouldn’t think they have a deep understanding, but they certainly support what I’m doing. Or my mum supports what I’m doing. My father and my mother got divorced when I was only 6.

HOLMES      Does he contact you?

DOTCOM     No, I’m not in touch with my father.

HOLMES      Ok. So your mother is very supportive. Are you close to your mother?

DOTCOM     Yes, very close.

HOLMES      She must be worried about all of this.

DOTCOM     Yes, she’s worried.

HOLMES      What kind of a kid were you?

DOTCOM     An adventurer, I guess. I always spent a lot of time in the forests, and I enjoyed exploring the outdoors.

HOLMES      Is this mainly in Germany, or is this up in Finland as well?

DOTCOM     Both. In Germany and Finland. You know, Finland is the country of a thousand lakes, so I’ve probably seen half of them.

HOLMES      So you like the physical outdoors as well.

DOTCOM     Yeah.

HOLMES      And were you also busy into this with the computers and did you-?

DOTCOM     Well, that started, you know, when I got my first computer when I was around 10, and that just totally hooked me and never left me since.

HOLMES      What excited you about the internet?

DOTCOM     Well, the internet is this whole new world that allows everyone to communicate and exchange information and be a perfect marketplace and just accelerate everybody’s lives. So, for me, the internet was the greatest invention of mankind so far. So you could become, especially during the first dot-com boom, you could become a multimillionaire overnight if you just had the right idea, because once you put it out there and people start using it, you could have critical mass within a week, and everyone would want to buy in. So, you know, the internet has opened this whole new business world and accelerated everything. You now have guys like Mark Zuckerberg who’s in his 20s and is a multibillionaire. There was no other industry before the internet that would allow you to achieve such unbelievable successes.

HOLMES      Now I find you are happy again. Since we came today, you’ve been a little bit down.

DOTCOM     You ask good questions, that’s why.

HOLMES      But you start talking about your love, the internet, and you’re happy again.

DOTCOM     I’m passionate about it.

HOLMES      Yeah. Could you be happy in this house again?

DOTCOM     Yes, I think I could.

HOLMES      Have you been unhappy here?

DOTCOM     Very. Very unhappy. I mean, there’s certainly scarring that still needs to heal, and it’s a lengthy process.

HOLMES      Some people hate you.

DOTCOM     Mm.

HOLMES      Why is that?

DOTCOM     They don’t know me, I guess.

HOLMES      Is it because they see it that you’ve stolen their fortunes?

DOTCOM     Well, that’s not accurate. I’m certainly not in the business of stealing anything.

HOLMES      You see, what about this fella we saw on the television on Sunday night, this video editor?

DOTCOM     Mm.

HOLMES      What’s his name? Mr Bushyhead.

DOTCOM     Yeah.

HOLMES      He says you pushed him out of your house, you cancelled his air ticket. He said you assaulted him. He said his computer was yours now. Did this happen?

DOTCOM     No, it’s complete nonsense. Completely-

HOLMES      Why would he make that up? He’s an Emmy award-winning video editor.

DOTCOM     Well, I think that has nothing to do with it. He made it up. Because there were several people there during that time, you know, the security guards, they witnessed what happened. They gave their statements to the police, and they said, ‘Look, there’s no case here. This is a civil matter, and we will not pursue it.’ And for the simple reason that this guy is just out to hurt me because I fired him.

HOLMES      So what he said didn’t happen?

DOTCOM     Not the way he said it.

HOLMES      Did you push him along in the corridor?

DOTCOM     Absolutely not. I’m not a violent guy. I never push anybody. I don’t hurt anybody.

HOLMES      Powerful, rich men can be bullying types of men.

DOTCOM     Yeah, but I’m not that kind of guy. You know, you can ask anybody who knows me. I don’t get physical.

HOLMES      And, of course, the great issue is copyright. Do you steal copyright?

DOTCOM     No.

HOLMES      Let’s talk about that when we come back.

(AD BREAK)

HOLMES      You say, and you have said countless times, you do not steal copyright.

DOTCOM     Yeah, that’s right.

HOLMES      But you facilitate that process, don’t you?

DOTCOM     No.

HOLMES      This is the guts of it.

DOTCOM     Well, the bottom line is if Megaupload is illegal, so is YouTube, so are countless other sites that allow user-generated content.

HOLMES      But that doesn’t make it right. It’s the same thing. You enable, all of you enable the theft of copyright.

DOTCOM     That is not correct. Any ISP who is connecting users to the internet has the same issue. The moment a person is connected to the internet, the ISP could be responsible. Windows, the operating system from Microsoft, allows you to watch that content on your computer. Are they responsible for people doing it? No. We are a hard drive that is connected to the internet. What you do with it is your responsibility, and we give you very clear guidelines of what you can and can’t do.

HOLMES      But you had built a billion-dollar business. There was something very exciting about what you were doing. And your own colleague Bram Van Der Volk, he wrote an email at some point. ‘We have a funny business. We’re modern-day pirates.’ And then Mathias Ortmann replied, ‘No, we’re not pirates; we’re just providing a shipping service to pirates.’

DOTCOM     Yeah, they were joking. They were kidding.

HOLMES      Yeah, sure. But that’s the same as being a pirate. In other words-

DOTCOM     Any ISP could say that. YouTube could say that. Anybody who is in the internet business and allows users access can say that, you see? And they were joking. It’s totally taken out of context.

HOLMES      But that is the guts. What they were saying was the guts of what you do. I mean, who I’m saying is you knew what was going on, that your customers were uploading files that didn’t belong to them, and you were turning a blind eye.

DOTCOM     Well, look, let’s be realistic here, ok? Anyone who is offering the kind of service that we had has to deal with the same issues, and the best example is YouTube, ok? They are having to deal with these issues every day, and if you go to YouTube now, right now, and you look for infringing material, you will find more there online right now than you would ever find in the history of Megaupload. It’s the reality of the internet. It’s not us facilitating that, ok? It’s society using our services.

HOLMES      But, you see, the problem- Because what I’m saying here is theft is theft.

DOTCOM     Well, a lot of people would not agree with that statement because copyright infringement, in the opinion of most people, is not theft. If you take a copy of something, the original is still there. No one took the original. You see, it’s not theft because nothing was lost because of it.

HOLMES      But you’re making the money, and the person who came up with the product is not making the money.

DOTCOM     Well, I didn’t make money-

HOLMES      You see, we had these people the other night. This woman made film.

DOTCOM     Yeah.

HOLMES      She lost a lot of money, this guy who makes the dirty films.

DOTCOM     Let me tell you about that independent film producer, ok, because I watched that programme. First of all, she didn’t just blame Megaupload. If you google her name, she blamed Google, she blamed YouTube. She blamed everybody. It was just convenient for that interview that it was about Megaupload. If they would have raided YouTube and thrown YouTube executives into jail, she would have had the same happy feeling that she had. Ultimately, she made a movie that has an IMDB rating of 4.1. I mean, that’s as low as it gets, ok? You can’t blame me, seriously, if people upload something to a website that we have created for online storage. You know, it’s not my responsibility. I’m not doing it. I’m not providing anyone with any links to that content.

HOLMES      But what the hell is the answer then?

DOTCOM     Well, the answer is a new business model for the content creators.

HOLMES      All right. Just quickly on Megaupload again, didn’t you, however, offer monetary rewards? You encouraged people to upload, and you had an ad that said the more popular your files, the more you’re going to make. In other words, the bigger the piracy you help me with, the-

DOTCOM     (LAUGHS) That’s not what it said. I mean, you are totally twisting that here. Let me explain something to you. Our rewards would not even pay for files set up bigger than 100MB. Any movie, any TV series, any such file is larger than 100MB, so how can anybody claim that we paid people for uploading movies? Not a penny has been paid to anybody who’s uploading a full-length movie.

HOLMES      Go back to the big problem. Is copyright an outdated idea? Can it no longer be contained?

DOTCOM     I think copyright has its right to exist, absolutely, and I think that it’s up to copyright creators to come up with new solutions that deal with the reality of the world we’re living in today. You need to have a new business model that works for everybody, where users get quick and easy access to content and are not prohibited based on their location or based on their internet speed and all these things.

HOLMES      Yeah, but why shouldn’t I say you can have the information when I, as the copyholder, am ready for you to have it?

DOTCOM     Well, because what happens is if you release a movie, ok, and that movie is not available in one geographic location, people there will know about the movie, and if there is an opportunity for them to get it, they will take that opportunity no matter if you want that or not. It’s how society deals with it.

HOLMES      You are not going to stop them is what you’re saying.

DOTCOM     Well, it’s not my job to stop them. It’s not my responsibility to stop them. I was an online service provider. It’s not my job to police what people are uploading. It’s the job of the content owners, and the law is very clear. If you create content, and you want to protect your copyrights, you have to do the work. You have to identify the infringements online, and you have to take them down; not me. And whenever you come to us and report something, we have taken it down.

HOLMES      The woman on the Sunday programme told us with her film, ‘Yes, yes, yes, we’ll take it down for you.’ And she’d say, ‘I’d look an hour later and it’s back up.’

DOTCOM     Mm.

HOLMES      How is that satisfactory for her?

DOTCOM     Well, it’s of course not satisfactory, and I don’t think that, in most cases, that would happen. If something is taken down, you know, the link doesn’t just reappear and come back to life. Someone would have to re-upload it. And the way our system worked, if we took a file down, a link down that was in your account, you would not permitted to re-upload to the same file. So it would have come from somebody else.

HOLMES      Let us talk about the politics, the slightly different aspects of the politics. Mr Banks, Mr John Banks, were you good friend of his?

DOTCOM     I wouldn’t say good friend, but I considered him a friend, yes.

HOLMES      He sat as this table.

DOTCOM     Mm.

HOLMES      Where did he sit at this table?

DOTCOM     Uh, there. (POINTS)

HOLMES      You sat there?

DOTCOM     I sat over there. (POINTS)

HOLMES      And he asked you to write a cheque for his mayoral campaign.

DOTCOM     Yeah, two cheques.

HOLMES      Did he say two cheques.

DOTCOM     Yeah.

HOLMES      What did he say about the two cheques?

DOTCOM     Well, I wanted to donate $50,000 to his mayoral campaign, and I was going to write one cheque, but then he asked me to make it two cheques.

HOLMES      I understand he said to you it would make it easier if he wrote two cheques.

DOTCOM     Well, he said that he could then say it’s anonymous, so he wouldn’t have to declare it if I did it that way.

HOLMES      So you made that donation.

DOTCOM     Yeah.

HOLMES      Then there’s a huge police bust, looking like the Second Coming, and when you’re in prison, your lawyer contacted Mr Banks. Why?

DOTCOM     Well, you know, I had two slipped discs. I had major back pain, and, you know, with my weight and my health problems, I was in severe pain in prison. And all I wanted was a thicker mattress, because the mattress in prison was this thick and basically sitting on a concrete slab. So for someone with my weight, it was like lying, sleeping on concrete, you see?

HOLMES      You wanted something for your back.

DOTCOM     I wanted something for my back.

HOLMES      And the word came back from Mr Banks - what?

DOTCOM     Well, it’s inappropriate, and he doesn’t want to help.

HOLMES      What was your reaction to that?

DOTCOM     Well, I don’t know. I mean, I would have done things differently. If I call myself a friend of someone and that person gets into trouble, I will try and help.

HOLMES      Were you angry?

DOTCOM     Uh, not so much angry. I would say more hurt. Mm.

HOLMES      You were hurt that he wouldn’t help you after you’d helped him.

DOTCOM     Yes. But not because of that. Because we had a nice thing going, you know. I mean, I thought he was a good guy. I still think he is a good guy. You know, it’s just the way he presented the whole situation, he just got himself into trouble by not being perfectly honest, you know?

HOLMES      John Key. John Key says he’d never heard of you until the raid was about to happen on your house. Do you believe that?

DOTCOM     Do you believe that?

HOLMES      Well, I have to notice that we’d had some fireworks.

DOTCOM     And some other things.

HOLMES      You lived in his electorate. He’d been to Hollywood where they were already trying to extradite you. I wonder how could he not have known about you.

DOTCOM     Yes, everybody wonders. He is running naked and telling people he has clothes on. Everyone can see he’s naked. See, I mean, it doesn’t make any sense. I know for a fact that John Key knew before January 19, and it’s going to be a topic in our court hearing, so I don’t want to reveal too much, but I know. And for him not to be upfront and honest about, to me, there’s really only one reason, and that’s the political interference element that could stop the whole extradition procedure. If we can show that the government he has had an active role in the magnitude of this whole case and had a proactive role rather than a reactive role to impress the United States Government, well, you know, there you have it. It’s a monster issue.

HOLMES      Do you believe John Key has lied?

DOTCOM     Yes.

HOLMES      Do you have evidence of this?

DOTCOM     Yes.

HOLMES      Then there’s the spying, the GCSB, the spying. A former prime minister, Sir Geoffrey Palmer, says the New Zealand Government could be liable for heavy damages for the illegal spying on your activities as a New Zealand resident. Should there be heavy damages?

DOTCOM     Well, I’m not interested in damages from the New Zealand Government. I’m interested to resolve this case. I’m interested for people to realise the people who attacked me, they made a mistake and that this needs to be resolved in a diplomatic fashion, and soon, because this is just going to drag on. It’s going to hurt everybody. It’s going to embarrass those who are attacking us. And there’s no point in taking this further.

HOLMES      If you got damages, of course, I suppose that could go some way to paying for a new broadband cable across the Pacific.

DOTCOM     Yeah, but if I would seek damages, I would not seek them in New Zealand. I would seek them from the US Government, which has acted in bad faith, and I would seek that also from Hollywood Studios who are paying the MPAA and Chris Dodd, you know, to do this kind of thing. And I think they are liable because there has been a lot of bad faith and a lot of misinformation going on in this case.

HOLMES      How long does your legal counsel think this will drag on for?

DOTCOM     Theoretically, it can take a decade, you know. So I don’t think anyone has any upside to that. Neither side has any upside in this whole case.

GREG BOYED

                    Kim Dotcom speaking there to Paul Holmes. Now, the internet billionaire’s claim that John Key has lied is a big one. John Key, it must be said, has repeatedly insisted that while he knew a German was living in the Chrisco mansion in Coatesville and his office had been told about Dotcom, he personally had never heard of Dotcom until briefed by the Solicitor General the day before the raid of the property. We look forward to seeing Mr Dotcom’s proof in court.