EFF formally requested the preservation of the data seized when the U.S. government shut down Megaupload.com and related sites in January of 2012, notifying the court and attorneys involved in the case that Megaupload’s innocent users deserve a fair process to control and retrieve their lawful material.

Instead of assisting the innocents caught up in the seizure, the U.S government summarily announced that it had finished its examination of Megaupload’s servers and announced that the companies that owned those servers – Carpathia and Cogent – were free to delete the contents.  Thankfully, both hosting services have agreed not to destroy users' data for the time being, and it appears that Megaupload is trying in good faith to help users get access.

Additionally, Carpathia Hosting created a website at www.megaretrieval.com allowing Megaupload’s lawful customers to contact EFF and provide information about the scope of the issue and the material made unavailable by the seizure.  If you believe you are one of these users, based in the United States, and are looking for legal help retrieving your data, please email your contact information to megauploadmissing@eff.org.