[artinfo] Fwd: In response to Caymans authorities and concerned public of Loophole4All.com - Press Release

Mon Mar 11 11:22:16 CET 2013

Press Release. March, 10th 2013, NYC.

A response to the statements of the Cayman Islands senior official
registrar Donnell Dixon, interviewed by the Caymanian Compass newspaper
about Loophole4All.com, a hack and leak of the Caymans Company Register
website. The full interview on Caymans newspaper:
http://www.compasscayman.com/caycompass/2013/02/20/Artist-sells-fake-Cayman-company-certificates
The video breaking news on Caymans national TV:
http://www.cayman27.com.ky/2013/02/18/hacker-claims-cayman-breach

On the 15th February 2013, Paolo Cirio Ltd. published Loophole4All.com, an
art project with 200,000 Caymans companies ready to be hijacked. It
generated international attention from the press, concerned locals, and a
new peculiar community of pirates of offshore businesses.

*Paolo Cirio, spokesman for Paolo Cirio ltd., responds to the Caymans press*

Mr. Dixon’s statements are false and he is scamming people. Mr. Dixon, his
colleagues, and the Caymans government sell incorporation of fake shell
companies, whose main purpose is to defraud the rest of world, causing
onshore budget deficits and ever-growing impoverishment. Mr. Dixon’s work
must be considered illegal, shameful, and "the biggest tax scam in the
world,” as the U.S. President Barack Obama described Caymans activity in
2008.

Mr. Dixon lies when he states that the information of companies registered
in the Caymans is public. Simple access to the list of Caymans companies is
granted only by request of a password, under legal disclaimers and with
limited search functionality. Then, for no more detail than the names, the
public must pay $35 for each additional entity, to reveal only a mailbox
address and the date of incorporation. It would cost the public more than
$7 million to get even a blurry picture of all the bogus companies falsely
based in the Caymans islands. This “public” data is yet another fraud Mr.
Dixon sells.

The Caymanian Compass reports that there are only 92,000 companies
registered in the Cayman Islands. However, the Loophole4all project
discovered 215,880 companies. Many of them had suspicious notes attached to
their names, showing how the Cayman Registry is nothing near an honest,
public account, but has been corrupted by multinational firms and local
lawyers.

Liberating information means moving data from a locked platform and
distributing it in a form that unveils and builds new knowledge. That is
why here for the first time ever, you can download the entire list of
Caymans companies:
http://Loophole4All.com/press/cayman_companies_db.csv
Now with it you can conduct your own investigations, make new art, or
whatever you want to do without the need to ask permission from Mr. Dixon.
However data is not enough. Get informed about the offshore centers through
the video documentary produced for this project:
http://Loophole4All.com/doc.php

*In response to the Bermuda concerned about being the next target*
http://www.royalgazette.com/article/20130221/BUSINESS02/702219958
Loophole4all won't reveal the country that it will attack next. Before
that, though, everyone is invited to shop on Loophole4All.com to crowd-fund
the next attack by the pirates of the treasure islands in the dark
international waters of legal loopholes.

*In response to the local businesses of the Cayman Islands that complained*
You can request to be removed from Loophole4All.com if you provide proof
that you’re an honest and real local business. However, first you should
ask for more transparency from the Caymans Registry (as someone of you
already did) to be sure that no one else could hijack your business. As
long as it's hard to verify your real information, it will be in danger.

*In response to the many pirates that brought and stole offshore companies*
We cannot confirm that you can withdraw money at offshore bank branches
using a certificate of incorporation as identification. However, it may
work as valid documentation, since the owners of the companies are
anonymous. A clarification for those who asked about the legality of the
project: to steal the identity of a Caymans company is illegal only in the
Cayman Islands, and Caymans court orders have very little credibility
abroad. Avoiding taxes by registering a company in the Cayman Islands is
legal everywhere. However, remember that hijacking offshore business is
here mainly promoted as a form of protest and not to scam other people -
that would invite the attention of the Interpol. Having a certificate and
not using it is totally legal.
As an alternative to hijacking a company, you can send your certificates by
mail to your country’s Minister of Treasury as another form of political
pressure.
If you buy a hand-signed certificate or a mailbox, you will have the
exclusive ownership of the company with a unique original printed
certificate to collect. The other two basic purchase options are for
unlimited copies.

*In response to tackling offshore centers, I would propose three simple
solutions*
- Banning trade with corporations registered in a place without employees,
manufacturing, or sales.
- Banning the promotion and advertising of offshore instruments.
- Establishing an International Tribunal of Economic Crimes.

Finally, with the following quotes, I'd like to dedicate this project to
people who gave their life for what today I believe is the front in a war
for possible social change through distributing the power of knowledge.

*"I want people to see the truth… regardless of who they are… because
without information, you cannot make informed decisions as a public"*
Bradley Manning, chat, 2010, unknown date and location.

*"Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to
keep it for themselves… We need to take information, wherever it is stored,
make our copies and share them with the world."*
Aaron Swartz, Guerilla Open Access Manifesto, 2008, Italy

*Some early international press coverage about the Loophole for All*
Interview:
http://www.theverge.com/2013/2/26/4031516/wanna-buy-a-loophole-paolo-cirio-makes-corporate-identity-theft-into
US:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/artinfo/artisthacker-invites-you-to-exploit-corporate-cayman-tax-breaks_b_2718672.html
http://www.fastcompany.com/3005965/200000-caymans-corporations-hacked-art-project
Norway:
http://e24.no/utenriks/hacker-selger-deg-tilgang-til-skatteparadis/20338465
Italy:
http://espresso.repubblica.it/dettaglio/cayman-sul-web-levasione-20/2201697
Spain:
http://blogs.20minutos.es/codigo-abierto/2013/02/28/loophole4all-paraisos-fiscales-al-alcance-del-99/
Greece: http://goo.gl/JvBfU
Germany:
http://de.blouinartinfo.com/news/story/869389/hacker-kunstler-paolo-cirio-ladt-dazu-ein-die-steuervorteile
Brazil:
http://www.select.art.br/article/da%20hora/paraisos-fiscais-ao-alcance-de-todos?page=unic

Thanks for the attention.
http://PaoloCirio.net