By Ben Kuchera
October 23, 2008 - 12:26PM CT

We know theft is against the law, and we know that when you download a song or a game without paying for it, there's a good chance that it's copyright infringement. But what about when you steal a virtual item? Dutch courts had an interesting case to deal with when two youths were sued for stealing in-game items from another youngster, forcing him to give up items in the game Runescape.

The youths were sentenced to community service for their crimes. In other words, theft of the virtual item has led to real-world consequences, a first for the Netherlands. There are other criminal aspects of this case, as it has been reported that the victim gave up the items after being physically assaulted in his room and threatened with a knife if he didn't comply. The case in question, however, dealt only with the stolen items, in this case an amulet and a mask. The 15-year-old and the 14-year-old were sentenced to 200 and 160 hours of community service, respectively.

Most significantly, the court treated the Runescape goods as though they were material items: "these virtual goods are goods (under Dutch law), so this is theft." This sets a strong precedent (at least in The Netherlands): these goods have real-world value, and they "belong" to you inasmuch as it's a crime to take them from you by force. This seems to be a very open-and-shut case, as it involves physical assault in addition to the theft, but cases rooted in virtual worlds may increasingly find themselves before meatspace judges.

Take EVE Online, for instance. The game has been home to many cases of virtual fraud, and in some cases the "crime" takes place over months, involving industrial espionage or plain-old social engineering to grab cash, plans, or simply destroy in-game property. EVE is a completely open, not to mention brutally competitive, world.