There is a massive issue re content theft, and that is it is so widely spread so fast. Normally it is resold as full-perm, so the resale becomes exponential. This renders the DMCA process in SL useless. As all DMCA gives you is the ability to remove an instance of your stolen IP when (and if) you ever happen to come across it. Considering the size of the grid and fact that most stolen content is only rezzed when the user wants to use it and not left on display (specially as they know its stolen!), this is close to impossible. The knock-on effect is that experienced content creators are not creating as much content as they would like, and also the content is not as good as it can be - as creators are hesitant to put too much effort into creating it. So the ability to remove or 'neutralize' the content identified as stolen is really necessary. On Linden Labs side there must be many ways of identifying re-distributed content. This could be from the transaction server - which records the transfer of each asset, or could be from utilizing a parent-child relationship on the UUID ... ie. each time an asset is copied a link is kept between originator asset UUID and new asset UUID. In most cases prims are copied using alt accounts which are then closed to prevent being traced. So once stolen IP is identified and a few conditions are set, eg:

• Creator (thief) SL account is dead
• Items are the same
• Creation date on original is earlier than stolen creation date

then all the stolen copies in-world should be deleted, or neutralized (marked as not rezzable and if rezzed taken down) Of course many (mostly copybotters and their alts) will start shouting about Linden should not play God in this case, but for the good of all SL content they should.