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DS pirate handed 2 year prison sentence

Nintendo continues piracy crackdown with device-blocking update

A prolific DS game pirate has been sentenced by a Kyoto court to two-and-a-half years in prison, as well as handed a USD 96,000 fine, for making over 1000 DS games available for illegal download on his website.

38-year-old Yoshiaki Asagiri was arrested late last year, reports Kotaku, before facing the court on charges of distributing games online without permission and breaking Japanese copyright law. The judge hearing the case said his crime "tramples" on the efforts of the copyright holders, who have spent tremendous time, effort and money creating these games.

The case's verdict follows Nintendo's release of a DSi firmware update which, according to various online forums, has stopped a number of piracy-enabling devices from working on the console. The firmware update, released at the end of July across Europe and on August 3 in the US, added Facebook functionality to the DSi hardware.

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