AEPOC general secretary Davide Rossi has refuted allegations in the Italian press that he is involved in any activity concerning the hacking of smart cards for pay TV services. The statement follows reports in Italian dailies Italia Oggi and La Sicilia that he is among 26 people suspected to be involved in an international ring of smart card hackers.
The public prosecutor of Syracus has started proceedings following investigations by the Guardia di finanza, the Italian fiscal police. “I had telephone and e-mail contacts on a monthly basis with just one of the alleged-hackers raided,” said Rossi in a statement released to Broadband TV News.”Certainly I did never encourage him to make any business from piracy or to violate any conditional access system. Not only, this man always granted me that he was not involved in any organization and that he was not committing any crime. I read from the news that 132 other people are under investigation, I don’t know them and I don’t know who they are. The official document sent to me by the Public Prosecution Office is informing me that I am investigated not as “involved in the organization” but as an “external supporter”. The above will be easily clarified, but I know (due to the scarce effectiveness of the Italian Judiciary system) that it will not be immediate.”
In the past few weeks raids have taken place across Europe in Poland, Malta, Greece, The Netherlands and France. In Sicily, the police seized 3,000 pirated smart cards, 102 computers, 2,000 smart card writers and €50,000 in cash. The operation is understood to turnover €30 million a year.
The Sicilian court case against the 26 people is part of a pan-European action against piracy. According to the report, the court has issued a further 33 arrest warrants. These include people from the Italian police. A total of 133 people across Europe are suspected of working in the group of hackers.
The unabridged statement from Davide Rossi is available as a PDF download from our website.