‘Pirate’ Site nHentai Sued in U.S. Court for Copyright Infringement

Nhentai, a popular adult site with dozens of millions of monthly visits, has been sued for copyright infringement. The lawsuit was filed by California company PCR Distributing, which operates several hentai brands. The complaint alleges that nhentai doesn't respond to takedown notices. The site attempted to settle the dispute confidentially months ago, but that attempt failed.

Manga and anime have become increasingly popular in recent years. These formats originate in Japan, but they are now popular all over the world.

Available in static and animated form, ‘hentai’ describes the adult versions of the above. With a growing audience of many millions of fans, hentai is also benefiting from the boom.

As with any type of media, not all consumers are paying for access. Anime and manga piracy is more prevalent than music piracy today, and hentai is no exception. The nHentai.net website, for example, had nearly 80 million visits in June this year.

Copyright holders are not happy with the unauthorized distribution of their content. Many take countermeasures, which often involves sending DMCA takedown notices to the ‘pirate’ platforms, but not all recipients respond by taking content offline.

Rightsholder Targets nHentai

California company PCR Distributing is one of the affected copyright holders. The company does business under various brands, including J18 and JAST USA, and sees nHentai as a major threat to its operation.

PCR obtained a DMCA subpoena a few weeks ago, requiring Cloudflare to unmask the people behind the site, which allegedly failed to process takedown notices. As is frequently the case, a court clerk swiftly granted the subpoena, requiring Cloudflare to comply. In this case, however, that wasn’t straightforward.

A few days after the DMCA subpoena was issued, lawyers representing nHentai slammed on the brakes. They argued that no personal data should be disclosed as the subpoena should have never been granted.

At the time of writing, the matter is still pending in court. NHentai’s opposition is well argued and certainly has a chance of success. However, even if the subpoena is quashed, nHentai’s legal issues are far from over, as PCR has just filed a full-blown copyright infringement lawsuit.

PCR Sues nHentai for Copyright Infringement

In a complaint filed last Friday at a California federal court, PCR describes nHentai as a popular ‘pirate’ site with dozens of millions of visitors. The site shares copyrighted material without permission, taken from digital or physical books, while the operators don’t allow users to upload content.

“NHentai.net is a widely visited platform for adult manga and doujinshi content, attracting over 79,000,000 visits per month,” the complaint reads.

“The website hosts a vast collection of hentai works, including commercially produced content, much of which, based on information and belief, is shared without proper authorization from the owners.”

The lawsuit emphasizes that nHentai doesn’t rely on user-generated content. Those types of services can typically rely on a safe harbor under the DMCA. In this case, however, nHentai can’t claim this protection, PCR argues.

“nHentai is not a user-generated content website. There is no user upload capability. Defendants are not ‘service providers,’ are not engaged in the storage of content at the direction of users, and thus are not entitled to any of the safe harbors afforded under Section 512 of the [DMCA].”

Failed Settlement Attempt

The complaint doesn’t identify the owners of nHentai, who have yet to be named. However, PCR and nHentai are certainly no strangers. Last October, attorneys for the alleged pirate site offered to confidentially settle all copyright infringement claims with PCR.

The proposed terms of the agreement are unknown, but PCR declined and insisted that nHentai should take down pirated copies of their works.

“In October 2023, the nHentai Defendants […] attempted to have PCR enter into a ‘HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL SETTLEMENT AND RELEASE AGREEMENT’ to settle claims, including copyright infringement, between the Plaintiffs and Defendants in this case. PCR declined the agreement and further requested the removal of its works from nHentai.”

Despite these efforts, nHentai allegedly failed to remove any of the infringing works in response to PCR’s takedown requests.

“Plaintiff or its agents sent DMCA compliant takedown notices identifying infringing works on Defendants’ website to the email address provided for reporting abuse. Additional DMCA-complaint takedown notices were sent to nHentai’s known service providers. However, 100% of the reported URLs remain active.”

Damages and a Broad Injunction

PCR accuses nHentai of various forms of copyright infringement and demands damages as compensation. In addition, the company seeks a broad injunction to effectively shut down the site.

The injunction should prohibit the site’s operator from infringing the copyrights of PCR’s works going forward and require the registrar of nHentai.net to transfer the domain to PCR.

If a domain transfer isn’t granted, the proposed injunction requires third-party intermediaries to block the domain in the United States. That would apply to search engines, hosting providers, ISPs, domain name registrars, domain name registries, and other service or software providers.

At the time of writing, nHentai has yet to comment on or respond to the complaint. However, given the site’s previous opposition to the DMCA subpoena request, we expect that it will file a response in due course.

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A copy of PCR Distributing’s complaint, filed at the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, is available here (pdf)

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