They used unusual tactics such as flooding peer-to-peer networks with decoy files that tie up users' computers and bandwidth.
Saaf denied that MiiVi was "a devious product" and that the company aimed to entrap users, stating only that it was part of MediaDefender's "trade secrets.
[6] Beginning on September 14, 2007, MediaDefender experienced a security breach caused by a group of hackers led by high school student "Ethan".
On September 14, 2007, 6,621 of the company's internal e-mails were leaked, containing information contradicting previous statements and details of strategies intended to deceive copyright infringers.
[15][16] One e-mail suggests using the MiiVi client program to turn users' PCs into drones for MediaDefender's eMule spoofing activities.
The leaked e-mails discuss responses to unexpected and negative press, and expose upcoming projects, problems in and around the office, Domino's pizza orders, and other personal information about employees.
[12] However, evidence exists that MediaDefender had been employing both legal and illegal actions to remove copies of the leaked emails from their respective hosting sites.
In addition to the usual cease-and-desist letters from their legal department, IP addresses that are owned by MediaDefender were found to have been used in denial-of-service attacks against sites hosting the leaked emails.
"[19] On September 16, 2007, MediaDefender-Defenders released a 25-minute excerpt of a phone conversation between the New York Attorney General's office and MediaDefender as a torrent on The Pirate Bay.
Revision3 CEO Jim Louderback accused MediaDefender of injecting its decoy files into Revision3's BitTorrent service through a vulnerability, then automatically perpetrating the attack after Revision3 increased security.