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“members”, had to ensure their uploaded files were downloaded at least once every 90 days or they would be deleted. It was only premium users who had any “realistic chance of having any private long-term storage”. It meant non-paying users who wanted to maintain uploaded content on the website had to ensure it was downloaded, or face deletion.

This is one of many points hotly contested by Dotcom, who says there was not a single unregistered user in four years who had a file deleted.

The sought-after files which earned reward payments included copyrighted works, said the FBI. As a result, it claimed the reward payments were for “the Conspiracy's ultimate financial benefit”. “The more popular content that was present on Mega Conspiracy servers would increase the number of visitors and premium users that the Conspiracy could monetise. In total, the Mega Conspiracy directly paid uploaders millions of dollars through online payments.”

There was a greater premium attached to popular files, it said, leading to increased advertising income for Megaupload. It meant, said the FBI, “every download on Megaupload.com provides a financial gain to the Conspiracy that is directly tied to the download”. The FBI also saw criminal inducement in Megaupload's spruiking of premium memberships. It said “non-premium users are repeatedly asked by the Conspiracy to pay for more and faster access to content on Megaupload.com”. The website also had its own video player, which it offered to users. The player would show new videos recently uploaded, and when downloaded, asked users if they wanted to create a new link for their own Megaupload account — a move which “facilitates distribution that is again inconsistent with private storage”.

The thrust of the FBI's claims was that the website was a fraud. It pretended to by a cyberlocker site, but it acted like a filesharing site which thrived on copyrighted material. It was a sleight-of-hand technique, which offered flashy distractions and excuses with one hand while the other broke the law and robbed copyright holders. The FBI even pointed to the absence of a search engine on the site as proof of its intent — saying the lack of a search engine “allows the Mega Conspiracy to conceal the scope of its infringement”. Instead, Megaupload relied on links posted to websites elsewhere on the internet — sites over which had it no control — which encouraged use of Megaupload's rewards program. In essence, its payment to users created conspirators who did its bidding, witting or not.

The linking sites drove traffic to Megaupload, boosting income. There was proof, the FBI said, that the Megaupload team monitored and corresponded with those third-party sites. The FBI claimed “some of the defendants have instructed individual users how to locate links to infringing content”.

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