Since the reign of the original Xbox, hacking team Team-Xecuter has built a reputation for defeating the digital locks that prevent users from running pirated games on consoles.

More recently, Team-Xecuter has been strongly linked to the Nintendo Switch scene but last year the operation hit the rocks when their operation found itself at the center of a criminal case prosecuted by the US Government.

Last year the US Department of Justice announced that two members of Team-Xecuter had been arrested. Max Louarn, a 48-year-old French national, and 51-year-old Gary Bowser from Canada, were placed in custody and charged under suspicion of being part of a criminal conspiracy. A third defendant, a Chinese man named Yuanning Chen, 35, was reportedly at large.

As that case progresses in the background, with Team-Xecuter’s future in the balance , Nintendo is now taking direct legal action against one of the defendants.

Nintendo Sues Gary Bowser in a US Court

Filed in Washington court on Friday, the lawsuit describes Bowser as one of the leaders of Team-Xecuter, which in turn is described as a “pirate operation” that unlawfully manufactures and traffics for profit an “unauthorized operating system” called ‘SX OS’ and associated circumvention devices.

“The purpose of the Circumvention Devices and the SX OS —developed, manufactured, and trafficked under Defendant’s leadership — is to hijack the Nintendo Switch by interrupting and bypassing its technological security features and protections,” the complaint reads.

“The Circumvention Devices strip away or circumvent technological protection measures Nintendo put into place to protect its invaluable copyrighted software and video games from unauthorized access and copying.”

Nintendo says that Bowser is one of a handful of key Team-Xecuter members running the operation day-to-day, including by trafficking in SX OS and circumvention devices via websites, marketing, managing advertising, liaising with manufacturers, and dealing with multiple resellers, several of whom have already been dragged through the courts in the US.

The gaming giant claims that Bowser operated at least four websites – Team-Xecuter.com, Xecuter.rocks, and Team-Xecuter.rocks, and Sx-Xecuter.com, through which SX OS and circumvention devices were marketed. Nintendo also claims that Bowser was the founder and operator of MaxConsole.com which served as a central location for customer and reseller support.

According to the complaint, Nintendo was able to match Bowser with the online handles “Gary opa” and “GaryOPA” since at times, the aliases appeared alongside the full name Gary Bowser. This shows that Bowser is Team-Xecuter’s “front man” and that he had control of the websites’ content, Nintendo adds.

Team-Xecuter and Gary Bowser – A History of Hacking

While the complaint only targets alleged Switch-related offenses, Nintendo supplies a potted history of Bowser’s involvement in the hacking scene dating back at least 13 years.

The complaint states that Bowser was charged in Canada in 2008 in connection with an “elaborate operation” to counterfeit Nintendo games and modify games consoles, adding that Bowser has trafficked in circumvention devices for several consoles prior to the Switch including Nintendo DS, Wii, and 3DS.

In respect of SX OS, Nintendo says it was wildly popular and at one point was pre-installed on 89% of modded/hacked Nintendo Switch products available for sale. This caused Nintendo “tremendous harm” and undermined the trust that third-party developers should have in Nintendo that their games won’t be illegally distributed or played.

Multiple and Sustained Breaches of the DMCA

Nintendo says that it should be protected by the anti-circumvention and anti-trafficking provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) but Bowser violated Nintendo’s rights by supplying SX OS and circumvention devices that defeated the company’s technological protection measures.

Trafficking in SX OS and circumvention devices has already been shown to be illegal, Nintendo writes, pointing to a pair of earlier Switch-related cases, one decided last December with a $2m judgment and another with a broad injunction .

“Notwithstanding some of the success Nintendo has had enforcing its rights against resellers of the Circumvention Devices, Defendant has continued to thumb his nose at the law, manufacturing and trafficking in the Circumvention Devices and SX OS,” Nintendo says.

“He has empowered resellers to re-emerge and launch new websites—including after the same websites had been shut down by courts and other vehicles of enforcement—and facilitated additional avenues of distribution, all forcing Nintendo into a game of whack-a-mole.”

Trafficking in Devices in Violation of the DMCA

Section 1201 of the DMCA prohibits the trafficking of devices that are primarily designed to circumvent technological protection measures that control access to and prevent the copying of copyrighted works. This includes their manufacture, importation, and sales to the public.

Nintendo says that Bowser violated its rights when it offered tools including SX OS, SX Tools, SX Installer, SX Server, SX Loader, SX Dumper, and similar software distributed via MaxConsole.com. The defendant also breached the DMCA when he selected and approved resellers of SX OS license codes, since that is considered a “service” as defined under the DMCA.

In addition, every time Bowser recruited people as testers of the SX Core and SX Lite products he shipped circumvention devices to those testers, which Nintendo says amounts to additional trafficking offenses.

For Bowser’s alleged violations of 17 U.S.C. § 1201 , Nintendo says it is entitled to the maximum statutory damages of $2,500 for each breach listed in two counts, plus costs and attorneys’ fees. The company also demands a permanent injunction prohibiting any further acts of trafficking in devices and software.

Nintendo also claims that Bowser infringed its copyrights when he displayed images of the company’s games on the Team-Xecuter site. Interestingly, the statutory damages for each infringement here are substantially larger than for breaches of the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provisions. For each of the nine images displayed, Nintendo is demanding $150,000 in damages plus, costs, fees and a permanent injunction.

Finally, Nintendo wants Bowser to hand over all the domains listed in the complaint, including all of the Team-Xecuter, Xecuter, and MaxConsole variants. It also demands an order that will allow it to seize and destroy all copies of SX OS and circumvention devices in Bowser’s custody.

Nintendo’s complaint against Gary Bowser can be found here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Hacking group Team-Xecuter has long been a thorn in the side of major gaming companies.

The group offers hardware and software solutions that allow people to install and play unofficial games – including pirated copies – on various consoles, including the popular Nintendo Switch.

Team-Xecuter often defended its work by pointing out that their products are not necessarily pirate tools. They are supporters of the ‘right to repair’ movement and back people who want to play homebrew games on their devices for personal use.

The affected game companies disagree, with Nintendo front and center. The Japanese gaming company has been chasing down Team-Xecuter for years and a few months ago the company took several online stores to court for selling Team-Xecuter products .

In October, these enforcement efforts reached a new level when the US Government launched a criminal prosecution of three of the group’s members.

Bowser aka ‘GaryOPA’

One of the defendants is Canadian Gary Bowser. He was arrested in the Dominican Republic in September and was deported to the US soon after. Bowser was allegedly responsible for the development of circumvention devices and maintained regular contact with resellers.

Bowser is perhaps best known through his nickname GaryOPA, the supposed operator and a frequent writer on the website “MaxConsole,” which regularly reviewed Team-Xecuter hardware and other hacking tools.

Flight Risk

In a ‘Zoom’ hearing held last week, a federal court in Seattle reviewed a request for pretrial detention, submitted by the US prosecution. It is not uncommon for criminal defendants to be released on bail pending their trial, but the US argues against this in Bowser’s case, as he’s considered a ‘flight risk.’ The court agrees.

“Defendant poses a risk of nonappearance due to his lack of ties to this district, ties to Canada and the Dominican Republic, ownership of a Canadian passport, history of international travel, unstable living situation, and an uncorroborated personal history,” US Magistrate Judge Michelle Peterson writes.

“Based on these findings, and for the reasons stated on the record, there does not appear to be any condition or combination of conditions that will reasonably assure the Defendant’s appearance at future court hearings,” she adds.

Bowser was not interviewed by the court, which currently has no information on his family ties, personal history, or employment. That leaves the door open to reopening the detention hearing at a future date, which may change things.

The Other Defendants

There is no update on the other defendants at this point. Based on the information in the court dockets, Yuanning Chen from China is still at large. According to the indictment, Chen managed a manufacturing and distribution company where Team-Xecuter’s hardware was made.

The third defendant, French national Max Louarn, was arrested in Canada where a U.S. extradition request was launched. The US Government sees Louarn, who’s hacking track record goes back to the early nineties, as the leader of Team-Xecuter.

Louarn allegedly made Team-Xecuter’s important business decisions, arranged investors and financing, and oversaw product development and the wholesale distribution chains.

Nintendo Takes Over Domains

The US criminal prosecution is not the only legal pressure on Team-Xecuter. Nintendo has also seen very active on the legal front. One of the stores it sued earlier this year, Axiogame.com, was allegedly operated by Team-Xecuter . That has been shut down through Nintendo’s lawsuit.

The Axiogame.com domain is now owned by Nintendo and over recent days the gaming company took over several other domains of former piracy hack stores, assisted by an updated court order .

Flashcarda.com switched to the new Materpl.com domain and both are owned by Nintendo now. The same is true for Txswitch.com that switched to Stxwitch.com, Usachipss.com that moved to Nerged.com, and several other domains.

Team-Xecuter Continues

Despite the mounting legal pressure, Team-Xecuter is far from defeated. In fact, the site’s main website remains online . The forum remains active as well, with people privately offering help to install or buy mods.

Team-Xecuter’s dedicated page for the SX product line is also still intact. This links to a list of authorized resellers. While many of these stores are offline now, a few are still actively selling.

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A copy of the detention order issued by US Magistrate Judge Michelle Peterson is available here (pdf) . Nintendo’s filing, pointing out the newly targeted shop domains can be found here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Nintendo is doing everything in its power to stop the public from playing pirated games on the Switch console.

Their major adversary is the infamous ‘hacking’ group Team-Xecuter , which released ‘jailbreak’ hacks and modchips for the popular game console.

Criminal and Civil Lawsuits

Last month, the US Department of Justice indicted three alleged members of the hacking group. This was a big move, but one that failed to take the group, or even its website, out of business.

The same can be said for several online stores that sell modchips and hacks for the Switch and other consoles. As part of a civil lawsuit , filed by Nintendo earlier this year, a federal court in Seattle granted an injunction that required several foreign stores to shut down. Again, this was easier said than done.

Since the store operators ignored all communication, Nintendo asked their domain registrars to transfer the domain names, as permitted by the court. This is precisely what happened. A few days after granting the injunction, Txswitch.com and other domains were signed over to the videogame company.

‘Hack’ Store Hops to New Domain

However, a day later Txswitch already appeared to have made a comeback, operating from Stxwitch.com. This site looks nearly identical to the old one and even uses the same logo and code.

This type of ‘domain hopping’ is common in pirate circles and Nintendo hoped that the registrar GoDaddy would take the new domain down as well. This would be in line with the injunction, which states that “any variant or successor” was also covered by the order.

Godaddy Demands Detailed Order

In the event, GoDaddy refused to take action without a court order that specifically spells out the new domain name, a new filing by Nintendo explains.

“Nintendo requested that the STXWITCH.COM domain be immediately transferred as a successor or variant of TXSWITCH.COM pursuant to the Judgment. GoDaddy responded to outside counsel for Nintendo stating that they required the domain name to be listed in an order to take action,” Nintendo writes.

The game company requests the court to clarify that, if new copycat sites appear, these are covered by the existing injunction. As such, registrars would be required to take action without a separate order that specifically mentions the new domain.

Putting and End to the Whac-A-Mole

Without such an order, pirate sites will continue to move to new domains, which means that the court has to keep issuing new orders, creating a whack-a-mole situation.

“Nintendo is concerned that absent such further clarifications of the scope of the Judgment, the Doe Defendants will again domain hop, changing a letter of a domain name, and the cycle will continue to repeat with the registrar contending that the new domain is not specifically covered by the injunction and with Nintendo having to return to this Court,” Nintendo adds.

By clarifying that domains of copycat sites and new variants or successors should be transferred to Nintendo, registrars such as GoDaddy will have to take action more swiftly.

This doesn’t mean that registrars have to “police the Internet” and proactively scan for new copycats, the company notes, as Nintendo will track down the new domains and report these accordingly.

Nintendo hopes that with sufficient clarification from the court it can prevent the piracy hack stores from “thumbing their nose at the court” while frustrating Nintendo’s enforcement efforts.

Dynamic Order Isn’t Perfect Either

The requested order is similar to the dynamic pirate site-blocking orders we have seen in other countries. While those deal with ISP blocking, they also allow copyright holders to add new domains names that pop up.

Given the order that’s already in place, it is likely that the court will grant the requested clarification. However, this doesn’t mean that Nintendo’s troubles are over. There are plenty of registrars and registries that don’t fall under US jurisdiction, after all. So the store may move to one of these next.

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A copy of Nintendo’s request for clarification and to enforce the permanent injunction is available here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Last week, the US Department of Justice indicted three alleged members of Team-Xecuter .

The group, whose modchips and software solutions help to facilitate game piracy, has long been a thorn in the side of Nintendo.

The authorities didn’t mention any involvement from the Japanese gaming giant in its investigation. However, considering the close eye that it kept on Team-Xecuter, the company was likely consulted down the line.

Nintendo Sued Switch Hack Stores

The timing of the criminal prosecution is interesting as well. It follows legal action in which Nintendo worked to shut down ROM sites and stores that sell Team-Xecuter products. In fact, one of the stores that Nintendo has an ongoing case against, Axiogame.com, is believed to be operated by Team-Xecuter.

Axiogame.com is one of the stores Nintendo sued in May . That case, which lists nine defendants in total, was filed against “John Does” as the operators are unknown. After filing the lawsuit Nintendo did its best to identify those running it, but without success.

Axiogame = Team-Xecuter?

The US Government appears to know more. Although all claims have yet to be proven, the Team-Xecuter indictment links Axiogame.com to game piracy conspiracy.

“The enterprise also sold its circumvention devices directly to individual consumers through its own online platforms. For example, LOUARN and CHEN sold modchips through an online marketplace called axiogame.com. This website sold modchips developed by the enterprise in addition to a variety of gaming accessories,” it reads.

After the criminal prosecution was announced Axiogame.com and Maxconsole.com, a review site also believed to be operated by Team-Xecuter, remained online. However, that changed yesterday and, at the time of writing, both can’t be reached.

Court Grants Injunction Against Switch Hack Stores

Nintendo has booked a victory of its own against Axiogame and the other online stores after a Washington federal court granted its request for a default judgment and permanent injunction.

The permanent injunction requires the store operators to stop any infringing activity, destroy any infringing products, and hand over their domain names. The injunction also applies to third-party services, including hosting companies and domain registrars and registries, who can be compelled to shut the sites down as well.

The injunction covers the sites Anxchip.com, Axiogame.com, Flashcarda.com, Mod3dscard.com, Nxcard.com, SXflashcard.com, TXswitch.com, Usachipss.com, Lowbr.com, Masterpl.com, Brujoon.com, Agresu.com, as well as any successors that may appear.

Axiogame.com’s downtime doesn’t appear to be a direct result of the injunction, as the site was already offline before it was issued. It seems more likely that it’s related to the criminal prosecution.

It will be interesting to see whether Nintendo will act on the information that was made public through the indictment. Now that it knows who’s allegedly behind Axiogame.com, it can replace the “John Doe” defendant with actual names.

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A copy of the default judgment and injunction obtained by Nintendo against the various stores is available here (pdf)

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Team-Xecuter is widely known for creating ‘hacks’ that bypass digital restrictions on Nintendo consoles.

The group has been chased by Nintendo for years, but today, their operation has become the center of a criminal case prosecuted by the US Government.

The US Department of Justice just announced that two members of Team-Xecuter were arrested recently. Max Louarn, a 48-year-old French national, and the 51-year-old Gary Bowser from Canada are in custody and charged in a criminal conspiracy. The indictments also name a third defendant, a Chinese man named Yuanning Chen (35), who remains at large.

The three indicted members are just a minority of the total group. According to the US authorities, there are more than a dozen Team-Xecuter members scattered around the world. These members help to code and create the Nintendo hacks, but they are also suspected of being involved in the production and sale of these devices.

The indictment portrays Team-Xecuter as a criminal enterprise and notes that its members did their best to evade law enforcement by using a variety of brands, websites, and distribution channels.

“These defendants were allegedly leaders of a notorious international criminal group that reaped illegal profits for years by pirating video game technology of U.S. companies,” said Assistant Attorney General Brian C. Rabbitt of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division.

“These arrests show that the department will hold accountable hackers who seek to commandeer and exploit the intellectual property of American companies for financial gain, no matter where they may be located.”

At the time of writing the official Team-Xecuter website remains online. Various online stores are also still selling the group’s chips, including the latest SX Lite, and the SX Core for the Nintendo Switch.

Team-Xecuter has repeatedly stressed the legal uses of its hacks. Speaking with TorrentFreak, Team-Xecuter defended its work just a few weeks ago

“We are firm believers of the right to repair legislation, a growing movement to counteract the monopolistic control over hardware which is the property of the consumer who paid for it in the first place,” Team-Xecuter said at the time .

According to the Department of Justice and the FBI, this was nothing more than a facade.

“The overwhelming demand and use for the enterprise’s devices was to play pirated videogames. To support this illegal activity, Team Xecuter allegedly helped create and support online libraries of pirated videogames for its customers, and several of the enterprise’s devices came preloaded with numerous pirated videogames.”

The three defendants are charged with 11 felony counts including conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to circumvent technological measures and to traffic in circumvention devices, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

Defendant Bowser resided in the Dominican Republic when he was arrested in September and has since been deported to the US. Louarn is in custody in Canada pending a U.S. extradition request, so he can stand trial in the US.

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This is a breaking story, we may amend this article and will report on the exact details of the charges in future reporting.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

Last month, Nintendo sued several stores that sell hacks which allow pirated games to be played on its Switch console.

These stores offer a range of products developed by Team-Xecuter, which the gaming company characterizes as a notorious piracy group.

This is not the first time that Nintendo has taken action. In recent years the gaming giant has sent numerous takedown notices targeting the group and in the UK it acquired an injunction to have local ISPs block its sites.

Until now, Team-Xecuter has never responded publicly but after the recent wave of lawsuits in the US, it’s now verbally striking back at Nintendo. The group dissociates itself from the ‘piracy’ label and believes that along with their users, they have the right to tinker with Nintendo’s products.

“Of course we are not happy with this kind of censorship that is being enforced by legal injunctions that make us out to be something we are not: a copyright-infringing ring of software pirates,” Team-Xecuter tells TorrentFreak.

Nintendo is particularly worried about the new SX Core and SX Lite products. These work on all Switch classic and Lite consoles, while previous ‘hacks’ were limited to a subset of devices. In addition, the devices no longer have to be connected to a dongle or computer to boot the consoles into the custom SX OS firmware.

With the lawsuits, Nintendo hoped to limit the availability of SX Core and SX Lite, but it couldn’t prevent them from being shipped out to customers this week. While some may use the hacks to load and play pirated games, Team-Xecuter notes that their products have a wide variety of use cases.

“Our products allow the end-user to make legitimate backups of their original cartridges that they can keep to themselves and play, but this is only a very tiny subset of what the SX products allow you to do. With SX you can expand your storage capacities of your console, run Linux, Android and a myriad of opensource applications, games, and utilities,” they tell us.

Nintendo sees things differently. After the company’s efforts to get to Team-Xecuter directly, it sued several stores that sell these products. Team-Xecuter characterizes this move as legal ‘scare tactics’.

In addition, Team-Xecuter points out that its products also allow amateur programmers to test their games and software on the otherwise closed ecosystem. That spurs innovation and allows aspiring coders to develop their talent.

“We believe many of these cases are based on legal scare tactics. But that is (sadly) enough to get a small vendor (often side-businesses ran by enthusiasts) who does not have the financial/legal capacity to fight such lawsuits in court to fold and stop their operations entirely.”

Scare tactics or not, the lawsuits appeared to give Nintendo some successes. Soon after they were filed, several stores shut down – or so it seemed . In a new filing this week, however, the game company told the court that several are available through new domains, still selling the same products.

This suggests that not all store owners are easily scared and are perhaps more organized than it may appear, intentionally trying to evade Nintendo’s legal claims.

Team-Xecuter is not directly targeted in these lawsuits but it stands firmly behind its activities. The group believes that people are allowed to tinker with products they legally bought, pointing to the growing “ right to repair ” movement which stand up for the same ideals

“We are firm believers of the right to repair legislation, a growing movement to counteract the monopolistic control over hardware which is the property of the consumer who paid for it in the first place,” Team-Xecuter notes.

Needless to say, the group will continue to develop its products. For now, there are still plenty of stores that offer them to the public at large, which includes tinkerers, developers, coders, and pirates. At the same time, Nintendo will try to score a victory in court.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.