--- title: "There Are Hilarious New Allegations About Those “You Wouldn’t Steal a Car” Anti-Piracy Ads" description: "The \"You Wouldn't Steal a Car\" anti-piracy ads may have, ironically, committed an act equivalent to stealing a car." date: "2025-04-29" modified: "2025-04-29" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/you-wouldnt-steal-a-car-allegations" categories: - "Future Society" tags: - "copyright" - "movies" - "piracy" - "tech" --- # There Are Hilarious New Allegations About Those “You Wouldn’t Steal a Car” Anti-Piracy Ads ![The "You Wouldn't Steal a Car" anti-piracy ads may have, ironically, committed an act equivalent to stealing a car.]() *\Image: MPA\* It would be really funny if those iconically preachy "[You Wouldn't Steal a Car]()" anti-piracy ads turned out to use pirated — sorry, *stolen* — materials, huh? Like, really really funny. Who could ask for a richer pièce de résistance to highlight just how outrageous its central thesis is: that downloading something from the internet is somehow just as serious or harmful an offense as grand theft auto? Well, readers, have we a plot twist for you. As [*TorrentFreak* ]()[reports](), there's a *very* high chance that the grungy font used for that now-infamous line may itself be a ripped-off version of someone else's typeface. Oops. The now-endlessly-memed PSA was first released in 2004 as part of the "Piracy. It's a Crime" campaign — and it was everywhere, first at movie theaters, before being stuffed into all your home movie releases. (The group behind the PSA was formerly called the Motion Picture Association of America, but now just goes by the Motion Picture Association, or MPA.) With the frenetic style of editing popular at the time, the ad starts off by showing a young woman clicking a huge "DOWNLOAD" button on a website with a banner that says "Feature Films" — because that's how pirating works — while a crunchy, uptempo electronic soundtrack that would sound more at home in a French parkour movie blasts in your ears. (An [alternative version]() starts with someone buying pirated DVDs from a street vendor.) Then it cuts to the "You Wouldn't Steal a Car" text flashing on a black screen, followed by a dude in a leather jacket jimmying open the window of an old Mercedes. Repeat for its other extraordinary lines, like "You wouldn't steal a handbag." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmZm8vNHBSU There's long been speculation about the provenance of the ad's materials, according to *TorrentFreak*, including some reports that claimed that the ad's music was pirated. These turned out to be false, but there does appear to be something amiss about the video's iconic font, FF Confidential. The typeface was created in 1992 by Just van Rossum, the brother of the guy who invented the programming language Python, and earlier this month, investigative reporter Melissa Lewis [observed]() that a free font called XBAND Rough appeared identical to it. After contacting van Rossum, Lewis [confirmed]() that Xband Rough was an "illegal clone" of his creation — "it's just been around forever and is ubiquitous," she wrote. You can see where this is going. Soon, another internet sleuth by the handle "Rib" [discovered]() that the MPA's anti-piracy campaign used XBAND Rough — not FF Confidential — in a brochure [shared on its website]() in 2005. The match was made with the software FontForge. Technically, this doesn't confirm that the video itself used the FF Confidential rip-off, only that supplementary campaign materials did — but it's strong evidence in that direction — an outcome that would be incredibly ironic (tellingly, the MPA [declined to comment to *Ars Technica*]().) "I knew my font was used for the campaign and that a pirated clone named XBand-Rough existed," Van Rossum told *TorrentFreak*. "I did not know that the campaign used XBand-Rough and not FF Confidential, though. So this fact is new to me, and I find it hilarious." **More on piracy:** *[Meta Says It's Okay to Feed Copyrighted Books Into Its AI Model Because They Have No "Economic Value"]()* ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()