Kim Dotcom to be extradited from New Zealand to US

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Kim Dotcom, who is facing criminal charges relating to the defunct file-sharing website Megaupload, is to be extradited to the US, the New Zealand justice minister has said. German-born Dotcom has New Zealand residency and has been fighting extradition to the US since 2012 following an FBI-ordered raid on his Auckland mansion. The justice minister, Paul Goldsmith, had signed an extradition order for Dotcom, a spokesperson said on Thursday. “I considered all of the information carefully, and have decided that Mr Dotcom should be surrendered to the US to face trial,” Goldsmith said in a statement. “As is common practice, I have allowed Mr Dotcom a short period of time to consider and take advice on my decision. I will not, therefore, be commenting further at this stage.” In a post on X on Tuesday, Dotcom said: “The obedient US colony in the South Pacific just decided to extradite me for what users uploaded to Megaupload,” in what appears to be a reference to the extradition order. Reuters could not immediately contact Dotcom for a response. US authorities say Dotcom and three other Megaupload executives cost film studios and record companies more than $500m by encouraging paying users to store and share copyrighted material, which generated more than $175m in revenue for the website. The company’s chief marketing officer, Finn Batato, and chief technical officer and co-founder, Mathias Ortmann, both from Germany, along with a third executive, the Dutch national Bram van der Kolk, were arrested in Auckland with Dotcom in 2012. Ortmann and Van der Kolk entered plea deals that resulted in them being sentenced in 2023 to jail terms in New Zealand but allowed them to avoid extradition. Batato died in 2022 in New Zealand.