The case may seem initially innocuous. A British swindler of 29 years, Ashley Mitchell, allegedly diverted 400 billion virtual token after having hacked ZyngaPoker servers, the popular network Facebook poker application.
Between June and September 2009, Ashley Mitchell would be pretends to a Director of the firm's game and would have been able to transfer 400 billion in virtual chips on a fake Facebook account. It would then "whitened" his virtual loot in before copying database back them to many other accounts faceboook so that crime goes under the radar.
At first glance, this diversion of virtual tokens may seem ridiculous... but many people buy virtual tokens on auction sites (who knows why!), so that Mitchell was able to resell to discount to £ 430 per billion chips. He was thus able to collect the pretty sum of £ 53 000 (about $ 85,000) and could get hold of £ 184,000 (approximately $ 300,000) if he had managed to sell all of its "stack" without getting caught.
According to Zynga, the losses are far greater than the gain of Mitchell. Zynga believes that the legal sale of 400 billions of chips will have him generate more than 12 million dollars. Zynga has filed a lawsuit against the young pirate. However, this situation is for the less problematic from a legal point of view: is it possible to fly a virtual product? How to establish the value of a currency virtually manufactured to perfection? Justice has finally established that Zynga had not been stolen, but that it indeed suffered financial losses as a result of the illegal sale of tokens. "The Court has found that, even if the virtual currency is not real and is infinite in the offer, it can still benefit from legal protection in the same way as real-world currency." This case could therefore well set a precedent and give "legal rights" to the virtual currencies.
Ashley Mitchell, who was already on probation for hacking computers of the local Council, admitted becoming "obsessed" by Zynga and pleaded guilty to five counts. He is detained in custody pending sentencing at a later date next month. Judge Philip Wassall, crime was sophisticated and it is inevitable that Mitchell is imprisoned.
Like what crime, even virtual, does not pay...
