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Kim Dotcom: ‘Bigger And Better’ Megaupload Coming In January 2017

By Anne Sewell
Published on: 00:47 PST, Jul 12, 2016

Kim Dotcom will be welcoming old and new clients with open arms when the file sharing website Megaupload relaunches on the fifth anniversary of its take-down by the FBI.

January 20, 2017 marks the fifth anniversary of the raid on Dotcom’s New Zealand mansion by the FBI, where Dotcom and three others were arrested by New Zealand police. The day before that saw his file hosting and sharing platform Megaupload taken down, with its servers confiscated by the U.S. Department of Justice.

Megaupload was originally launched in 2005 and allowed its users to store files online, with up to 200GB storage space for free users and unlimited storage for “premium” members of the website.

As reported by Yahoo! Tech, the platform was used by many as an alternative to the peer-to-peer file sharing systems as a means of sharing files illegally, including movies, music, games, and books. Copyright holders were angered by this, which ultimately led to Megaupload being taken down as, while Dotcom was situated in New Zealand, his servers were located in the U.S.

One year later, Dotcom announced the launch of a new website, Mega, which he touted as having an almost equivalent service, but with increased security, and to protect himself, the servers were located in New Zealand.

However, while there were no speed limitations for downloads, Mega cut users’ free storage space down to 50GB and introduced bandwidth limits. Due to these limits, the website never had quite the same success as its predecessor.

Not to be outdone, Megaupload is once again set to return.

Founder Kim Dotcom took to Twitter to make the announcement, saying, “Megaupload comes back on January 20, 2017, the 5th anniversary of the raid. It will be better than the original and it will feel like home.”

In a series of 140-character messages, Dotcom revealed what the newly introduced website will offer. According to him, the streaming service will be back and will be better than ever.

A further tweet read that Megaupload will offer 100GB free cloud storage, on-the-fly encryption, ability to sync user devices and, best of all, unlimited transfer.

According to a report by RT News, the newly introduced Megaupload will use Bitcoin instead of PayPal for payment, as the latter company blacklisted Mega over its “unique encryption model.”

As an added incentive, Dotcom has offered beta access a week prior to the Megaupload relaunch to those who tweet about the return of the file sharing website.

The larger-than-life internet entrepreneur has also promised that original Megaupload accounts will be reinstated with premium privileges and the relevant users will be contacted by email once the website is up and running.

Former employees and employees of Mega are also being welcomed back with open arms by yet another tweet: “To former Megaupload and current Mega employees. We welcome you with open arms. Mega App developers, we have a great deal for you. Ping me.”

To show he’s still up and running despite the legal battles Dotcom has fought over the last five years, Megaupload will be up and running again on the fifth anniversary of the raid, on January 20, 2017.

Dotcom even got musical about the whole new deal.

[Photo by Hannah Peters/Getty Images]

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