After steadfastly protecting the privacy rights of subscribers, usually against aggressive rightsholders determined to unmask them, ISPs today are more likely to view disclosure from a different perspective.

At a time when internet subscriptions paid most of the bills, protecting customers accused of illicit file-sharing led to prolonged litigation. Cases were fought up to the highest courts in the United States. In Europe, further still.

When rights organization Promusicae sued Telefonica in 2005, demanding the identities of customers accused of using KaZaA to pirate music, Telefonica fought tooth and nail all the way to Europe’s highest court.

Telefonica argued that under Spanish law, ISPs were under no obligation to hand over customer details to rightsholders intent on civil litigation. On January 29, 2008, the Court of Justice of the European Union agreed, handing Telefonica – and its customers – a landmark win.

Laws Change, Priorities Change

Over time, legal amendments and the drive for profit rendered Telefonica’s win irrelevant. ISPs were already selling internet access alongside mobile phone contracts, live TV subscription packages, VOD services, music, and other valuable content, the vast majority of it regularly pirated online.

As a result, the past several years have seen the traditional bright lines between exclusive rightsholders and ISPs licensed distributors become increasingly blurred.

Common Interests Are the Main Focus Now

In 2024, controversial legal action by LaLiga, Spain’s top-tier football league, led to Telefonica disclosing the identities of alleged pirate subscribers, based solely on LaLiga’s allegations.

If Telefonica resisted at all during closed-door discussions on disclosure, only evidence of cooperation has seen the light of day. If that proves unpopular with a subset of customers, not much can be done. Since rival ISPs are also cooperating with LaLiga, jumping ship in protest would be completely pointless.

Disclosures are now said to take place on a rolling basis, with LaLiga supplying IP addresses and Telefonica naming names. LaLiga’s subsequent letters, sent to freshly deanonymized subscribers, contain offers to settle for a few hundred euros. Financial penalties like these are meant to act as a deterrent and a forceful reminder that LaLiga matches should be purchased from licensed distributors.

Those distributors include Movistar Plus+, a subscription digital TV platform owned by Telefónica, that currently accounts for almost half of the Spanish market. Telefonica paid 1.2 billion euros for the rights to broadcast LaLiga matches.

TV channels owned by Sony, Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount, and Comcast are also distributed through Movistar Plus+. Anti-piracy agreements between LaLiga and Movistar Plus+, and with the channel owners via the MPA, sees URLs/domains delivered to Telefonica and other ISPs, on a weekly and monthly basis, to enable effective blocking of pirate sites.

You Scratch My Back, I’ll Scratch Yours

Of course, similar agreements between rightsholders ISPs are common elsewhere, although nothing quite as unusual as the arrangement detailed in a DMCA takedown notice sent to GitHub earlier this week.

While the sender’s identity isn’t 100% clear due to numerous redactions, GitHub’s report indicates Telefonica. In basic terms, the notice requests removal of an .M3U playlist which allegedly provides access to content to which Movistar owns the rights. GitHub responded as expected by disabling the repository which rendered the file inaccessible.

In other respects the DMCA notice is both unusual and somewhat confusing. In response to the question, “Are you the copyright holder or authorized to act on the copyright owner’s behalf?” the sender said “Yes, I am the copyright holder.”

In a notice sent by Telefonica, that’s nothing unusual, much less something to quantify in an explanatory wall of text that, if anything, seems to contradict the copyright holder declaration made earlier.

The unlikely conclusion is that in order to protect content distributed by Movistar, to which Telefonica directly or indirectly owns the rights, the telecoms giant has entered into an anti-piracy agreement with LaLiga, Spain’s top football league. The agreement authorizes LaLiga to act on Telefonica’s behalf as follows:

While the terms ‘monitoring’ and ‘removal’ are self-explanatory, ‘enforcement’ could apply to any number of measures, some of which are only available to exclusive rightsholders.

Nevertheless, this is an intriguing situation that could play out in unpredictable ways. Quite simply, since the ideals behind the 2008 victory are dead and buried, increasingly vulnerable pirates may like to keep that in mind.

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 With billions of annual visits, MissAV ranked among the top 60 most-visited websites on the internet.

For years, the site appeared to operate without any significant setbacks, but that changed a few days ago, when several domain names including MissAV.com and ThisAV.com were seized.

Initially, it wasn’t clear how permanent these seizures were, as the domains briefly became accessible again. However, that changed a few hours ago when the Japanese adult entertainment producer Will Co. LTD announced that these actions are backed up by a U.S. federal court order.

The company sued the foreign defendants Ka Yeung Lee, Youhaha Marketing, Promotion Limited, and several “John Does”, holding them responsible for the copyright infringing activities on MissAV.com, ThisAV.com, and several related domains.

In the early stages, the defense argued that the American court had no jurisdiction over the defendants, who are mostly linked to Hong Kong. However, the Washington District Court disagreed and allowed the case to continue.

$4.5m Default Judgment

When the defendants eventually stopped responding, the Japanese rightsholder requested a default judgment in its favor.

In addition to seeking $45 million in damages for copyright infringement, the plaintiff requested an injunction allowing it to take control of several pirate domains, including thisav.com, missav.com, myav.com, missav789.com, vassim.com, eightcha.com, and fivetiu.com.

The default judgment was granted last week, effectively putting an end to the case. Instead of the requested $150,000 for each of the 300 infringed works, the court settled on a tenth of that, bringing the total damages award to a still sizable $4.5 million.

The order (pdf)
 

Perhaps of equal importance is the injunctive relief which allowed Will Co. to take control of the domain names through the .com domain registry VeriSign. This took some time to process, but the handover is now complete with all domains pointing to a seizure banner.

Seized

Domain Seizures Send an Important Message

Anti-piracy firm Battleship Stance, which helped to orchestrate the enforcement action against MissAV and ThisAV, is happy with the outcome of the long fought legal battle.

“We are pleased with this ruling, which not only delivers justice for Will Co. but also strengthens the position of creators in their fight against international piracy,” says Jason Tucker, president of Battleship Stance.

The U.S. court order against foreign pirate sites is particularly important, as this indicates that rightsholders can take effective legal action against stubborn pirate sites.

“The transfer of these domains sends a clear message to pirate operators that they risk losing their assets when they steal content. Our commitment to defending creative works remains unwavering as we continue the fight against digital piracy,” Tucker explains.

Lead counsel for the plaintiff Spencer Freeman agrees, noting that the case shows that foreign websites with ties to the U.S. can be held accountable.

“This case sets a precedent for stronger enforcement of U.S. copyright laws against foreign entities. It underscores the importance of pursuing legal action across borders to protect intellectual property rights globally,” he says.

MissAV Remains Online

Despite the positive comments, MissAV and the related sites are not completely out of action. The site registered a new .ws domain name and continues to operate from there, not mentioning any of its legal troubles.

Jason Tucker of Battleship Stance informs TorrentFreak that they are aware of these new domains and that legal actions are already underway to prevent the further spread of pirated content.

For now, however, Will Co. is celebrating its win. And after this success in the Washington District Court, it’s likely that Will Co. and other rightsholders will try to use a similar procedure to go after more pirate sites in the future.

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 With 40 million players worldwide and over a billion views on YouTube, the Poppy Playtime game series has gained a massive following.

Created by the American indie game studio Mob Entertainment, the game is particularly popular among fans of horror games and online content creators. A planned Poppy Playtime live action movie will only add to this lure.

Poppy Playtime’s success hasn’t gone unnoticed. As is often the case, popular games serve as inspiration for other developers. That’s fine, but when others use the same brand and content to attract users, a line is clearly being crossed.

‘Copyright Infringing Scam Apps’

According to Mob Entertainment, this is precisely what happened on Google Play. In a new lawsuit filed at a federal court in California, Poppy Playtime’s creators accuse developer ‘Daigo Game 2020, Inc’ of releasing ‘scam’ applications on Google Play.

The unauthorized games versions were advertised as “Poppy Playtime: Chapter 3” and “Poppy Playtime: Chapter 4” and allegedly contain many works protected by Mob Entertainment’s copyright. The comparison below does indeed show striking similarities.

Similarities 

Poppy Playtime’s developer notes that these knockoff games confused many thousands of players, not least due to ‘Chapter 3’ and ‘Chapter 4’ bring uploaded to Google Play before these versions were officially released.

Aside from using Poppy Playtime’s name, logo, and characters, the ‘scam’ apps offer very little to the user. The complaint notes that the app is not a game at all. Instead, it asks users to pay $30 to $95 for the “Guide wuggy playtime mod.”

“When users pay for the “Guide wuggy playtime mod,” all they receive is a link to a dead webpage,” the complaint notes.

‘Google Play Failed to Take Apps Offline’

The complaint doesn’t just target the developers of these alleged scam apps, it also lists Google as a defendant. The plaintiffs allege that Google receives 15% or 30% of the unauthorized sales and failed to take proper action in response to DMCA notices.

Mob Entertainment says it contacted Google on various occasions, using the web-based takedown form and the email address [email protected]. These requests to remove the allegedly infringing app didn’t yield a satisfactory result and can be summarized as follows.

– October 31, 2024: Takedown request sent for unauthorized Poppy Playtime Chapter 3 app

– November 1, 2024: Google confirms receipt

– December 5, 2024: No response, Mob Entertainment sends a follow-up

– December 9, 2024: Google responds, stating that the app will be removed

– December 9, 2024: Google removes “Poppy Playtime Chapter 3”

– December 13, 2024: “Poppy Playtime Chapter 3” returns to the Play Store (same URL)

– December 13, 2024: Mob Entertainment informs Google that the app returned

– December 16, 2024: Google confirms receipt

– December 19, 2024: Mob Entertainment sends another DMCA takedown notice

– December 19, 2024: Google asks the developer to use the web-based takedown form

– December 30, 2024: Takedown request sent for unauthorized Poppy Playtime Chapter 4

– December 30, 2024: Google confirms receipt

Mob Entertainment argues that, despite these efforts, Google did not expeditiously remove the copyright infringing applications, which are still available in the Play Store to this day.

Scam apps? 

Poppy Playtime Requests Damages

Google’s alleged inaction makes the company ineligible for DMCA safe harbor protection, the lawsuit notes. As such, it can be held liable for copyright infringement.

“Google forfeited the benefits of the DMCA’s safe harbor provision for its infringement of Mob Entertainment’s copyrighted works contained in the unauthorized ‘Poppy Playtime: Chapter 3’ and ‘Poppy Playtime Chapter 4’ applications.”

Mob Entertainment accuses Google and Daigo of both copyright and trademark infringement, and they request to be compensated. This includes potential statutory damages of $150,000 per work.

In addition, the indie game developer seeks an injunction preventing both Google and Daigo from infringing its copyrights and trademarks going forward.

—

A copy of Mob Entertainment’s complaint against Google and Daigo, filed yesterday at the California federal court, is available here (pdf). Neither defendant has responded to the lawsuit thus far.

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 With close to a billion active monthly users worldwide, Telegram is one of the most used messaging services.

The communication platform helps to connect people from all over the globe, with optional end-to-end encryption providing improved security compared to some other players in the market.

Telegram can also be an excellent medium to broadcast messages to a wider audience. Through dedicated one-way channels, people can share news, status updates, and emergency alerts, for example.

Z-Library & Anna’s Archive

In ‘piracy’ associated circles, Z-Library has one of the most followed Telegram channels of all. The shadow library’s official channel amassed over 630,000 subscribers over the years, who were among the first to read site announcements and other key updates.

Z-Library previously had some of its messages removed due to copyright infringement. While it didn’t upload or directly link to infringing material on Telegram, rightsholders allegedly complained about the links that were posted to the Z-Library website.

In response, Z-Library chose to no longer include links to its own homepage on Telegram. Instead, it referred users to Wikipedia and Reddit, where the links were still available.

The same copyright awareness was visible at Anna’s Archive, a popular shadow library search engine. This channel was also careful not to post direct links to infringing material. After all, sharing or uploading copyrighted books would undoubtedly lead to trouble.

Telegram Disables Channels Without Notice

Despite the reported caution, the channels of both Z-Library and Anna’s Archive are no longer accessible today. Messages posted by these accounts were purged “due to copyright infringement”, as shown below.

Posts removed

Telegram didn’t limit its action to removing posts; the channels are now entirely inaccessible. Those trying to access the channels in the Telegram app receive a pop-up message stating they are “unavailable due to copyright infringement.”

Channels Disabled
 

The simultaneous removal of both channels suggests they are linked to the same complaint or decision. The specific complaint and alleged copyright infringements remain unclear. Telegram’s press contact didn’t immediately respond to our request for comment.

What Copyright Infringements?

An Anna’s Archive representative states that they are also unaware of the reason for the suspension. Telegram didn’t inform them about the channel suspension, and Anna’s Archive says that Z-Library – who they are in good contact with – was not informed either.

“We took care not to link to any infringing files or websites from the Telegram group,” Anna says, adding that they have no idea why this happened.

It’s possible that infringing links may have slipped through somehow and coincidentally raised ‘repeat infringer’ flags for both channels. Another option is an unreported legal complaint or proceeding triggering this action.

At this point, we can only speculate about the reason for the removals. But if it’s tied to legal action, India comes to mind.

Telegram was previously ordered by an Indian court to share user details. These courts also issue broad blocking orders against pirate sites, often affecting third-party intermediaries, so Telegram’s involvement is plausible.

What we do know is that the targeted websites remain readily available. Z-Library didn’t return our request for comment, but the site has launched a new Telegram channel, which already has a few hundred subscribers.

New Z-Library Channel
 

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 Excellent infrastructure and limited anti-piracy action made Malaysia a popular hosting location back when torrent sites were in their prime.

Then seemingly out of nowhere, in 2008/2009 the government began shutting down popular sites including Extremebits, Rapthe, Superfundo and later, LeechersLair. One BitTorrent tracker owner discovered to his surprise that a device was quietly gathering data from the site’s server.

At the time widely attributed to the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission, these physical shutdowns were followed in 2011 by something new. After previously promising never to censor the internet, the Commission announced the imminent blocking of a number of pirate sites, including thepiratebay.org, megaupload.com, megavideo.com, movie2k.to, putlocker.com, and several others.

Effectively a gallery of hand-picked Hollywood targets, in hindsight the list could’ve been seen as a statement of intent. Few of the sites survived long enough to experience much blocking, Megaupload in particular.

No Turning Back

With blocking increasingly common, in 2017 the MPA published a report, titled How Site Blocking in Malaysia Has Significantly Reduced Online Piracy. The study claimed that six months after the completion of six site-blocking waves, traffic to blocked pirate sites had decreased somewhere between 67% to 74%.

Up to Three-Quarters of Piracy eliminated (slide credit: MPA)

Despite the reported success against blocked sites, success against the unblocked sites quickly meeting demand required even more blocking. The next wave of success and the subsequent and inevitable rise of other unblocked sites kept Malaysian authorities busy; in 2019 (438 sites), 2020 (644), and in 2021 (347).

Whether some or all of these ‘sites’ were clones, mirrors, or proxies, or potentially just new domains, wasn’t revealed. In total 1,429 ‘sites’ were added to the blocklist, but that was only the beginning.

Slide credit: Ministry of Domestic Trade & Consumer Affairs (MDTCA)

While pirate site blocking has been around for almost 20 years, key aspects of this enforcement measure never change. The history of site blocking in Malaysia shows the same pattern and may even provide a textbook example.

1. Initial Blocking Request Never a One-Off, But it Will Succeed

The SOPA disaster in the United States showed that acceptance of site blocking measures can’t be taken for granted. Opinions vary, but two key mistakes haven’t been repeated since: 1) encouraging mass opposition by demanding too much, too early and 2) misjudging the importance of timing.

After appearing on the USTR’s Priority Watch List in 2000 and 2001, Malaysia quickly showed “significant improvement” and was moved to the less oppressive Watch List a year later. For the next decade the USTR found no reason to change the status quo but after blocking some of the world’s most popular sites in 2011, Malaysia was removed from the Watch List the very next year.

The MPA’s 2017 report cited earlier suggested that subsequent site-blocking was another success for Malaysia. Failure at that stage would’ve been unthinkable and could’ve fatally dampened enthusiasm for any further blocking. After so much effort, that was never likely to happen.

Additional Requests Always Follow

The blocking of 1,429 additional ‘sites’ in 2019/20/21 suggests that ‘success’ in 2017 triggered a massive increase in blocking requests.

A study published by the Asia Video Industry Association (AVIA), which counts the MPA’s members among its own, reported significant ongoing success in 2020. The details appeared in a government presentation, Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights in Malaysia, and were just as impressive.

Slide credit: Ministry of Domestic Trade & Consumer Affairs (MDTCA)

In summary then, we have a background of blocked pirate sites losing between 67%-74% of their traffic (MPA/2017), and a 64% decline in Malaysian consumers accessing pirate streaming sites in 2020. If we assume that new copyright law, providing for up to 20 years in prison for online pirates, acted as a deterrent following its introduction during 2021, Malaysia should’ve been well on its way to even greater success.

Unfortunately, the rule that success always leads to more blocking requests, was confirmed in a Malaysian government announcement this week.

Over 3,600 Sites Offering Pirated Content Blocked Since 2021

According to a Bernama report, the latest data made available by the Malaysian government show that a total of “3,682 illegal websites offering and spreading pirated content” were blocked between 2021 and November 2024.

Minister of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living, Datuk Armizan Mohd Ali, said his department (KPDN) carried out the blocking in collaboration the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) and local ISPs.

“This is part of the ministry’s commitment to protecting local creative works from being exploited illegally,” he said. “KPDN will continue to strengthen cooperation with various agencies involved in efforts to address digital piracy issues.”

With the total number of sites blocked since 2019 now at 5,100+, the most important question is whether these considerable blocking efforts have had a positive effect and if so, what were they, and who benefited?

Based solely on the somewhat confusing figures presented above, in theory piracy should’ve been eliminated given the reported collapse in pirate site attendance. While that’s unlikely, a progress report on the stated aim of protecting local content shouldn’t be completely impossible.

In the meantime, a certificate of appreciation signed by the Premier League must count for something.

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 The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only.

Downloading content without permission is copyright infringement. These torrent download statistics are only meant to provide further insight into piracy trends. All data are gathered from public resources.

This week we have two newcomers on the list. “Gladiator II” is the most shared title.

The most torrented movies for the week ending on January 13 are:

Note: We also publish an updating archive of all the list of weekly most torrented movies lists.

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 Pirate streaming apps and unauthorized IPTV services have gained popularity globally in recent years.

Latin America is no exception to this trend but unlike other regions, one pirate streaming brand clearly stands out, MagisTV.

The MagisTV name is used by dozens of websites, many of which are reseller platforms. While some of these might be related, the name is also used by unrelated entities, simply because the brand has become synonymous for pirate IPTV.

A Notorious Market

Rightsholders worldwide are not pleased with the brand’s dominance and have worked hard to counter it. The Motion Picture Association and ACE have targeted MagisTV services for several years and local copyright holders have done the same.

This resulted in several referrals that reportedly resulted in criminal investigations in Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela. In addition, MagisTV-related websites have been blocked in several countries too.

Last week, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative elevated the MagisTV concerns once again by adding the brand to its latest list of notorious piracy markets.

“MagisTV is one of the world’s most popular IPTV services and operates primarily in Latin America. The service provides unauthorized access to live sports streams, television channels, and on-demand movies and television shows to its customers for a monthly subscription,” USTR wrote.

U.S. Trademark Application

It’s clear that the brand’s popularity comes with both threats and opportunities. To seize the latter, Chinese MagisTV-linked companies reportedly applied for related trademarks in several countries, including Argentina, Ecuador, Mexico, and Uruguay.

These applications have met resistance in some instances. In Ecuador, for example, the local football league LigaPro teamed up with Paramount Pictures and DIRECTV to successfully protest a trademark application.

In Ecuador, the Chinese company ‘Shenzhen Geshan Technology’ applied for the trademark. A company from the same region, ‘Shenzhen Huiyi Electronics’, recently did the same at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Magis TV Trademark
 

The application passed the first hurdle, as shown above, and a notice of allowance was sent to the registrant. However, there is still an opportunity for third-parties to object to the application. Considering the fierce opposition in Ecuador, there will likely be protests in the U.S. too.

MagisTV -> Flujo TV

Whether a trademark battle is needed at this point is questionable. More recently, several popular MagisTV services have decided to rebrand to ‘Flujo TV’ (Flow TV). This includes magistv.la and magistv-venezuela.com, which were both branded a ‘notorious market’ by the USTR.

Rebrand to Flujo TV

The rebranding doesn’t appear to be directly related to the USTR listing, as it already started earlier. However, it is clear that the operators of these sites and services are eager to move away from the tainted MagisTV brand.

Another Flujo

At the time of writing, many of the major MagisTV services have adopted the “Flujo” name. The reason for the rebranding is unknown. These services don’t care about copyright infringement, so any prospective trademark issues shouldn’t easily scare them either.

Perhaps those involved hope to evade being targeted in ‘dynamic’ domain blocking orders with a new name, at least for a while?

That said, a new name doesn’t make these pirate IPTV services any less ‘infringing’ so, if they continue, we will likely see many “Flujo TV” targeted enforcement efforts going forward.

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 So-called ‘three strikes’ anti-piracy schemes were once considered a cutting-edge response to P2P piracy.

Also known as ‘graduated response’, a typical scenario would see rightsholders monitor BitTorrent swarms to capture participants’ IP addresses sharing their content illegally. Those IP addresses would then be reported to a friendly (or coerced) ISP for matching against subscriber records, as a prelude to ISP customer outreach.

An initial letter sent to a subscriber would typically advise that piracy is illegal, so stop it. A second more strongly worded letter would follow in case of continued infringement, with a third letter heralding termination of the subscriber’s account.

Eircom (Now Eir) Resisted, Then Got on Board

Following legal action by the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA), representing EMI, Sony, Universal and Warner, Irish ISP Eircom reached a settlement with the labels in 2009, leading to the introduction of a similar program, albeit to a background of legal complications.

As the labels attempted to force other ISPs to comply, ‘three strikes’ was taken off the table, then put back on. By then, however, sharing music via BitTorrent had almost completely collapsed, with most pirates preferring YouTube and the free-tier of Spotify.

Piracy at 3 Little Piggies

With the majority of music piracy now taking place on sites ripping music from YouTube, it’s remarkable that a three-strikes scheme dating back 15+ years is still operational at Eir. Proof of that arrives courtesy of Paul Walsh, owner of the 3 Little Piggies cafe on Union Quay in Cork, who recently received a warning letter from Eir confirming his first-ever piracy ‘strike’.

No Love?

Walsh seemed genuinely surprised by the letter. Speaking with Corkbeo, he said he’d never seen anything like this before.

“I’ve never seen a notification like this. It’s kind of worrying that they’re saying the onus is on you,” Walsh said.

The letter contains a warning about the consequences of future infringement, including termination of Walsh’s internet connection should infringement continue. In common with all similar communications, the person paying the bill faces allegations; in this case, regardless of the fact that Walsh is a business customer of Eir, operating a free Wi-Fi service for the benefit of customers.

“What alarms me about this is that it’s the first time we’ve seen this and they’re saying I’m the one liable. If you want to get more serious, what if someone downloads something they shouldn’t be downloading? That’s opening up a can of worms,” he said.

Eir Apologizes, Warning Letter Sent in Error

Receiving an apology from an ISP is extremely rare in these cases, but Walsh received one nonetheless. In a statement, Eir encouraged all users “to be aware of copyright laws in both residential and business settings” while acknowledging that the ‘three strikes’ program only applies to its residential customers. Those with a business account are exempt, so the warning letter shouldn’t have been sent in the first place.

This effectively removes the ‘strike’ and eliminates the threat of future disconnection. Good news for a business owner and customers alike, even though one of them appears to have triggered this chain of events by downloading and sharing an album. Or did they?

Information and Notification

A document leaked in 2009 claimed to detail the draft protocol for administering the ‘three strikes’ program. One section detailed the minimum information that must appear in a notification for Eir (then Eircom) to consider a notification valid.

Minimum Information Requirement

Without losing sight of the age of the scheme, in terms of evidence the minimum requirement detailed above is fundamentally sound. What is evident, however, is that the level of detail in the notice received by Paul Walsh is well below that previously considered the minimum.

Below Minimum Evidence

Despite the major record labels driving this entire program, the requirement to identify the copyright holder making the allegation appears to be missing at the point of delivery. But more interesting than that is the requirement to provide a “time stamp of when the investigation was initiated” and the “time stamp of when the investigation was completed.”

The warning letter clearly states that the ‘investigation’ began at 16:45 on the day in question, and ended at 16:45 on the very same day. That’s not an investigation, it’s a passing glimpse; and indeed, a glimpse of what exactly?

The requirement to provide a hash for the copyright material detected also appears to be absent from subscriber warning letters. Eircom requested these values “to verify that the copyright work identified by the record companies is in fact owned by them.”

For the same reasons, those receiving a warning letter would also find the information useful. For business subscribers exempt from notification it’s mostly irrelevant, but for residential bill payers – who may also share their connections with many other people who pay nothing – liability very often appears to be taken for granted. And without sufficient information to fight back, the chances of winning are extremely slim.

There are claims that mistakes simply aren’t made; 3 Little Piggies receiving this letter in the first place clearly shows otherwise.

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 Adult entertainment is massively popular online and there are many pirate sites that specialize in this niche.

In Asia, Japan in particular, MissAV is the leading player. The site, which has a strong focus on uncensored Japanese Adult Videos (JAV), is listed among the 15 most-visited websites in the country.

With over 300 million monthly visits, it’s also one of the most trafficked websites globally. This is a major frustration for rightsholders of adult content, including FANZA, which is owned by the Japanese Internet company DMM and blocks foreign traffic.

MissAV Confiscated

FANZA has been trying to curb this problem for a while, in part through enforcement actions. This paid off a few hours ago when the official MissAV.com domain was seemingly confiscated. The same applies to ThisAV.com, another popular adult site connected to the same operators.

Instead of adult content, these domains suddenly displayed a warning banner in multiple languages, clarifying that these unauthorized domains were confiscated as part of a legal procedure.

“The domain you accessed was a site that handled illegally uploaded videos. Therefore, the domain was confiscated through legal procedures,” the message reads.

“We want to remind you that it is a crime to infringe copyright and upload videos without permission. Using such sites encourages the crime of illegal uploading.”

Caution
 

In Japan, a slightly different message appeared. There, visitors get additional information about FANZA, which notes that payments for legal content help to fund new content. This banner also redirects people to the official FANZA website.

MissAV Bounces Back

While the significance of this enforcement effort shouldn’t be understated, as the news unfolded it appears that the deck was reshuffled once again.

Apparently, MissAV didn’t lose full control over its domain names. While writing this article, they started to redirect to MissAV.ws, which provides the same unrestricted access to the site as before.

This suggests that FANZA’s ‘legal procedure’ had a limited effect. It’s not clear what happened precisely, as details about the legal basis for the enforcement action is not known to us.

What we do know is that the domains previously used Cloudflare’s nameservers, then switched to one controlled by its domain registrar Namecheap. After the new DNS propagates, the original domains then redirect to MissAV.ws.

Previous nameservers
 

One possible, but unconfirmed, scenario is that Cloudflare was ordered to take action against MissAV through a legal procedure. If that’s the case, MissAV’s operators would still have control over the domain, allowing them to simply redirect it by removing the ‘compromised’ nameservers.

Whatever the case, it’s clear that MissAV is firmly in the crosshairs of FANZA and other rightsholders. So, this might not be the last enforcement action of this kind.

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Manga and anime have become increasingly popular in recent years. These formats originate in Japan but are now in demand worldwide.

Similar popularity also extends to the adult counterpart known as “hentai,” which has millions of avid fans.

Like other forms of media, not everyone accessing hentai content chooses to pay for it. Instead, many people opt for free websites like nHentai.net, which averaged close to 80 million visits in recent months.

Nhentai Sued by Publisher for Widespread Piracy

Nhentai.net has been around for over a decade but in a move last summer, California company PCR Distributing described the site as a threat to its business. PCR does business under various brands, including J18 and JAST USA, and views the ‘pirate’ site as unlicensed competition.

Initially, PCR requested a DMCA subpoena asking Cloudflare to unmask the people behind the site, after they allegedly failed to process takedown notices. These requests are typically straightforward but not in this case, as Nhentai decided to object.

Facing opposition, PCR dropped the subpoena request. Instead, it decided to file a full complaint at a California federal court. According to the publisher, Nhentai shares copyrighted material without obtaining permission from rightsholders.

“[Nhentai] 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 complaint read.

Nhentai Fights Back with a Vengeance

Nhentai’s initial opposition already indicated that the site doesn’t plan to leave these allegations uncontested. And indeed, when PCR requested early discovery, Nhentai objected, pointing out that PCR had granted express permission to use its copyrighted works.

This week, the alleged ‘pirate’ site went a step further, requesting the court to dismiss the lawsuit in its entirety. The request isn’t based on a single issue; Nhentai says there are several grounds for the court to end the lawsuit prematurely.

Not the author

First, Nhentai argues that it isn’t clear whether PCR is actually the ‘author’ of all works. Some official copyright registration records list ‘JAST USA’ as the author.

Although PCR claims to operate under the JAST USA brand, the defendants argue that PCR is a separate company and has not provided sufficient evidence to demonstrate that they possess the necessary licenses or assignments for the copyrighted works.

“Public records for JAST USA show it has an entirely separate status as a ‘stock corporation’ with what appears to be different ownership, i.e., no overlapping directors, officers, addresses, etc. from those shown in PCR’s corporate filings,” the motion to dismiss alleges.

From the motion 

Nhentai asserts that this potential discrepancy in ownership is sufficient grounds to dismiss the lawsuit.

What is Copyrighted?

The defense also brings up another copyright concern. They point out that it’s not clear what is actually copyrighted. The Nhentai website mostly shares images, but some copyright registrations refer to literary works, which might not cover the images in question.

“Under copyright law, ‘Literary works’ specifically exclude images,” they argue. “This is critical because Plaintiff has not demonstrated any right to sue for copyright infringement as to the images.”

Along similar lines, Nhentai contends that works registered as “English translations” may not grant the plaintiffs ownership of the corresponding images displayed on their website.

Too Late

Nhentai further argues that there are various problems with the timing of the lawsuit. Some of the alleged copyright infringements are barred as the statute of limitations has allegedly passed, for example.

In addition, Nhentai believes that some of the copyrights were registered years after the associated images were distributed on its site. This means that the copyrights for the works were not registered when they were originally uploaded.

“In such an instance, the law mandates that Plaintiff is not entitled to statutory damages or attorneys’ fees as to this copyright,” Nhentai writes.

“Plaintiff also cannot show entitlement to statutory damages and/or attorneys’ fees on the other basis in section 412, as the work was not copyrighted within three months of publication,” the motion to dismiss adds.

Copyright Registration Timing

Permission Granted

Finally, Nhentai’s attorney also highlights that a representative of PCR’s brands previously granted written permission via email for use of their content and had even explored the possibility of running paid advertisements on the site.

One of the emails suggested that piracy helped manga and anime to grow in the West. It stated that “this isn’t a takedown request or a DMCA”, offering a collaboration instead.

Email (provided as evidence) 

Given this alleged ‘permission’, as well as the other arguments put forward in the motion, Nhentai believes that PCR has no legitimate claim for copyright infringement. Therefore, the case should be dismissed.

No Tongan Connection

If the court ultimately decides not to dismiss the case at this stage, Nhentai would at least like it to strike all claims related to Nhentai.to. This site used the same name, but Nhentai.net says that it’s an entirely unaffiliated operation.

“Plaintiff states that Defendants also own and operate the URL nHentai.to.’ As discussed in a hearing before Magistrate Richlin, the website nhentai.to is wholly unrelated to www.nhentai.net,” they write.

The ‘.to’ in nhentai.to refers to the Kingdom of Tonga, an island in Polynesia. It has nothing to do with Plaintiff’s allegations against Nhentai.net,” they add.

PCR has yet to respond to the claims presented in the motion. In an upcoming reply, it’s expected to share its side of the story, which will likely paint a completely different picture. After that, it will be up to the court to render a decision.

A copy of Nhentai’s notice of motions and motion to dismiss, filed at the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, is available here (pdf)

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

 With limited choice mostly a thing of the past, domain names today are available in many flavors. Above all others, however, the gTLD (generic top-level domain) .com is the most enduring.

Domain Tools data shows that of all TLDs, .com is the stand-out leader with 153,999,258 domains registered at the time of writing.

In distant second place, with 17,195,162 registered domains, is the German ccTLD (country code top-level domain) .de, with .net taking third spot with 12,477,708.

The current ranking of ccTLD .to is only revealed after considerable scrolling; 256th it transpires, with just 26,241 domains currently registered.

For perspective, Zonefiles reports that 129,614 .com domains were registered in the last 24 hours alone. Yet despite relative obscurity, .to domains have always been appreciated by pirate sites and, right now, they’re proving more popular than ever before.

Tonga Does Domains Differently

The Tonic Corporation opened for business in 1997 and during its first day, reportedly sold around 100 .to domains. Anyone who bought a domain from Tonic 28 years ago will appreciate the nostalgia visiting tonic.to today; text aside, nothing has changed.

The same applies to the product but that’s not a negative; Tonic’s approach was ahead of its time. As of today, the .to extension still denotes the ccTLD for Tonga, a small island nation in the South Pacific. It’s also still marketed more like a generic global domain than a ccTLD, imposing none of the region-based restrictions or requirements found elsewhere.

The Go .to ccTLD For Pirates?

In 1997, buying a .com domain was a laborious exercise, but Tonic mostly eliminated the form-filling, accepted payment, and registered the domain. When customers register a domain today, Tonic still requests some information relevant to the registration.

It may come as a surprise to those who believe that .to domains are anonymous, but the information requested is fairly comprehensive. Those details include first name, middle initial, last name, billing address, country, email address, plus the all-important credit card details to complete the sale. Perhaps another surprise: if served with a court order, Tonic will hand everything over.

In 2021, the MPA accused Tonic of doing little to prevent pirate sites from using the .to ccTLD, suggesting that it could simply disable domains names if it wanted to. Prominent examples included domains operated by some of the most well-known pirate sites; rarbg.to, fmovies.to, kinox.to, serienstream.to, 1337x.to, torrentgalaxy.to, solarmovie.to, ibit.to, and bs.to.

Tonic was clear, however, that random requests are no substitute for the rule of law.

“The .TO registry complies with court orders from courts of competent jurisdiction, including US courts, and has on many occasions taken down domain names in compliance with court orders,” TONIC’s Eric Gullichsen informed TF.

Since then, MPA/ACE have obtained DMCA subpoenas compelling Tonic to hand over the registration details behind dozens of pirate sites.

What information Tonic discloses is not for public consumption. However, reports suggest that, if information provided by domain registrants isn’t useful, especially when a third-party proxy is the registrant, anything handed over to comply with a subpoena won’t be useful either.

A Small Sample of Big Problems

Over the years, almost 500 .to domains have made an appearance on the UK’s pirate site-blocking list. They include former high traffic domains like watchseries.to, which dates back more than a decade, to relatively young domains popularized in the last five years; bflix.to and onionplay.to, for example.

Given the current trend of treating domains as disposable, to be discarded whenever site-blocking or search engine penalties limit their usefulness, some piracy platforms have stuck to their .to domains through thick and thin.

TorrentGalaxy.to is an obvious example, likewise 1337x.to. If its fortunes hadn’t shifted so dramatically in 2023, it’s likely that RARBG would still be a proud .to domain owner today. Other veteran sites including glodls.to, rlsbb.to, and limetorrents.to, still operate .to domains today.

Some sites, however, make much more noise, even in the face of enforcement action.

Sflix.to: A Single Example From Many

While all major pirate sites are subjected to pressure, streaming site sflix.to has received more than its fair share of attention.

After being blocked by courts in the UK and Australia in December 2021, Sflix.to was added to the PIPCU-maintained IWL (Infringing Website List) in April 2022. It remains listed today in the company of around 80 otherwise diverse domains with the same extension.

Yet, if visitor numbers are any indication of success, Sflix.to easily exceeds the standard.

In October, directly after sites with similar branding were shut down in Vietnam, Sflix.to received 43.8 million visits. By November, that had increased to 49 million visits and then, seemingly out of nowhere, traffic in December collapsed to ‘just’ 23.6 million.

The coincidental debut appearance of sflix2.to in December more than balanced things up; total visits for the month (from a standing start) 57.2 million.

Tonga’s Lure Remains

Sflix.to and other previously mentioned pirate domains are just a few examples, there are many more operational today. Apparently, the .to lure is strong and enduring.

A brief sample of popular and enduring sites, sporting familiar brands and .to domains, is sufficient to show that major pirate sites still prefer .to domains over hundreds of others readily available.

—

Our aim is to present current main domains only, so we have excluded a number of high-traffic domains where switches to new, non .to domains are currently underway. The order of the list has no value and by default, all sites should be considered a security risk.

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

The ease with which IP addresses and BitTorrent downloads can be tracked has created a fertile ground for copyright lawsuits.

This inherent transparency has fueled thousands of lawsuits against alleged video pirates, both in the U.S. and around the world.

In the United States, Strike 3 Holdings has emerged as a key player in this legal landscape. The company, known for adult entertainment videos published under the ‘Milfy’, ‘Tushy’, and ‘Vixen’ brands, pursues legal action against those who share its content illegally.

‘John Doe’ Lawsuits

When these videos leak and are shared on pirate sites, Strike 3 takes action. After collecting the IP-addresses, it typically files a complaint, requesting a subpoena to obtain the subscriber’s details. Once the target is identified, the case can move forward.

John Doe
 

These lawsuits can be a lucrative business, especially when targeted defendants opt to swiftly settle the action for a few thousand dollars. The money comes on top of the deterrent factor that is often cited by copyright holders as one of the main reasons to take action.

Legal pressure can deter the accused pirates and, perhaps, some of their neighbors too. There appears to be no shortage of pirates yet, though, not even within Strike 3’s niche market, as exemplified by Strike 3’s track record.

3,900+ Cases Filed in 2024

More than a decade ago, there were many rightsholders deploying this strategy in U.S. courts. Nowadays, Strike 3 mostly acts alone, but that doesn’t mean that their activity has diminished.

Since 2017, the adult company has filed over 15,000 cases against alleged pirates. These repetitive complaints barely ever reach the news, but they continue to target real people. Not just that, the number of cases has also increased steadily since 2020.

Strike 3 Cases
 

Last year, Strike 3 is listed as a party in 3,932^(*) cases filed in U.S. federal courts. This is a new all-time record. Never before has a copyright holder filed this many individual cases in a single year.

For comparison, in 2017 – the first year Strike 3 was active – all copyright holders combined filed 1,019 cases related to file-sharing. At the time, Malibu Media was the most active copyright litigant.

Strike 3 Holdings also dominates when it comes to all copyright cases filed in the US. According to Justia, over 7,000 copyright cases were filed in 2024, with Strike 3 responsible for more than half of that total.

Recently filed…

Settlements and Dismissals

With this level of workload, it’s no surprise that most Strike 3 cases are resolved relatively swiftly. Of all lawsuits filed in the first half of 2024, more than 88% have already been closed. This typically happens when the parties reach an out-of-court settlement or if Strike 3 drops a complaint for other reasons.

There have been a few rare instances where alleged pirates have fought back. For example, when Strike 3 filed a lawsuit against a 70+-year-old retired police officer, the defendant prevailed and ultimately ‘won’ a fees and costs award of $47,777.

Strike 3 has also had significant windfalls. In some instances, where defendants failed to respond, the adult entertainment company scored big wins, including a $108,750 damages award.

Overall, the fact that Strike 3 continues to file news lawsuits, while also increasing its output, suggests that they are getting more out of this than it costs.

—

(*) Note: the numbers presented here are based on a PACER and Justia searches for cases filed between January 1 and December 31, 2024, where ‘Strike 3’ is listed as a party. For 2024, all possible non-copyright cases have been filtered out.

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

After labeling DoodStream the world’s largest illegal video hosting site, the major Hollywood studios, Netflix, Amazon, and Apple, teamed up in a lawsuit filed against its India-based operators at the High Court of Delhi.

The need for urgent action was underscored by the scale of the DoodStream operation; according to the MPA, 2.69 billion visitors in 2023 alone. A March 2024 injunction issued by the High Court compelled the site to purge itself of all links to the plaintiffs’ content inside 24 hours. An April 5 filing by the plaintiffs informed the Court that didn’t happen, with a filing by the defense two days later by arguing otherwise.

Non-Compliance, With Attitude

As described in court documents, some kind of technical roundtable subsequently took place, attended by a technical expert appointed by the plaintiffs and two representing the defense. More specifically, the DoodStream defendants – Raja Durai and Sarvesh Chandran – were permitted to act as the site’s technical experts, despite actively running the site while in breach of a court order, and the site paying users for content uploaded.

That process led to the plaintiffs claiming that 1,512 tested links were still live. The Court tested six links at random, five of which remained functional. Counsel for the defendants said his clients had done their best under the circumstances; removing a million infringing links is very big job.

To help prevent infringement moving forward, the plaintiffs requested the removal of certain site features attractive to infringers. The defendants refused to comply, citing their “inability to remove these features.” Another request, to place content uploaders’ usernames next to content they uploaded, was rejected “due to the lack of infrastructure and technical feasibility.”

Interim Injunction

In a trade barriers report submitted to the U.S. government, the MPA reported that an interim injunction issued by the High Court of Delhi had proven ineffective. After failing to fully comply with any of the High Court’s orders, in September 2024 contempt proceedings against the defendants were described as “ongoing.”

The injunction attempted to ban DoodStreams’ operators “and all those acting for/on their behalf” from running the site. A list of domains was provided for convenience.

It’s not clear whether all of these domains were in active use at the time, but many remain active today and still report significant traffic.

Data collected by TF in December for November 2024 reveals examples including dood.li (120m), doods.pro (30.6m), dood.to (15.8m) and doodstream.com (5.5m), among dozens of similar domains that mostly redirect to the DoodStream frontpage.

Minimal Progress, Slowly

When first filed in March 2024, the complaint against DoodStream and its operators didn’t look much out of the ordinary. As the months progressed and the site remained online, the contrast between this lawsuit and actions against pirate sites based overseas, seemed to stand out.

In dozens of site-blocking actions, for example, requests for urgent action are usually met with a suitable response. More extreme measures, including compelling overseas domain registrars to disable domain names, have been signed off in days and then revisited in cases of non-compliance.

This case, albeit one contested by the defendants, has seen court orders and an injunction meet with non-compliance and ongoing infringement at considerable scale. But perhaps most jarring of all are comments from the defense suggesting that some of the Court’s instructions are optional, or at least up for negotiation.

More nuance may be available in court filings that aren’t made available to the public, but one statement explaining why the High Court of Delhi’s orders carry less weight than one might expect, really is quite something.

From Russia…
 

The next hearing is scheduled for early February.

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

 In the early 2000s, the music industry took a stand against online piracy by going after tens of thousands of alleged pirates through U.S. courts.

The RIAA tracked down IP addresses of suspected music pirates and requested corresponding DMCA subpoenas, hoping to link these addresses to subscribers’ contact details.

This initially worked well. However, as the practice became more common ISPs began to object. They countered that DMCA subpoenas don’t apply to mere conduit providers. Appeal courts eventually agreed and effectively banned the practice decades ago.

Rightsholders were still able to sue alleged pirates. However, instead of easily obtaining the identities through a relatively cheap DMCA subpoena procedure, they would have to file a full complaint in federal court, with full judicial oversight.

‘Copyright Trolls’

This more cumbersome path was not ignored. In the late 2010s, waves of lawsuits were filed in U.S. courts targeting alleged BitTorrent ‘pirates’. The associated account holders were still identified through a subpoena but this time within a proper copyright action.

This practice, which some refer to as ‘copyright trolling’, is still prevalent today. Every year, many thousands of copyright lawsuits are filed in the U.S. These are typically closed within months, often after an undisclosed settlement is reached with the defendants.

Most of the cases against alleged pirates are now filed by a single adult entertainment company, Strike 3 Holdings. There are other companies that are interested in identifying pirates too but the relatively high filing fee for these lawsuits is seen as a roadblock.

DMCA Subpoena Revival in Court

To bypass these costs, some rightsholders have started to revive the DMCA subpoena shortcut. Drawing inspiration from the RIAA’s early efforts, they once again used the DMCA subpoena process to obtain the personal details of suspected copyright infringers.

These recent DMCA subpoenas progressed quietly, and many were granted with little fanfare or pushback. That changed in 2023 when a Cox subscriber, suspected of pirating the movie Fall, filed an objection in court.

The objection prompted Cox Communications to intervene. The Internet provider challenged the use of DMCA subpoenas, as detailed in DMCA §512(h). Similar to the earlier opposition against the RIAA’s attempts, the ISP argued that DMCA subpoenas don’t apply to mere conduit providers, as defined under § 512(a).

Last year, a district court judge in Hawaii sided with Cox. The court ruled that DMCA subpoenas don’t apply to mere conduit services, but do apply to other providers that store or link to infringing content directly. As such, the movie companies’ request for a subpoena was denied.

Movie Companies Appeal

The movie companies, including Voltage Holdings, Millennium Funding and Capstone Studios were persistent. They filed a petition at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that the district court’s interpretation of the DMCA was overly narrow.

The movie studios argued that the district court’s decision relied on dated precedents, which don’t reflect the realities of the modern Internet. They countered that ISPs do play a role in facilitating piracy, even if indirectly, and should be subject to DMCA subpoenas.

“A careful reading of the full text of 17 U.S.C. §512 leads to the unquestionable conclusion that Congress intended for DMCA subpoenas to apply to §512(a) service providers despite the contrary conclusions of Verizon and Charter,” their petition read.

In December, Cox responded to these arguments at the Court of Appeal. According to the ISP, Congress clearly excluded ISPs from this legal DMCA subpoena ‘shortcut’.

EFF Chimes in with ‘Troll’ Warning

Cox is not the only one to stand up against the movie companies. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) recently filed an amicus curiae brief, urging the court to keep the status quo intact.

Without naming names, EFF warns that allowing the DMCA subpoena route to identify ISP account holders will feed ‘copyright trolls’. They will see it as an easy route to obtain swift settlements, including those against innocent subscribers.

Whether settlements are planned by the movie companies in this case is not clear, but EFF notes that classic copyright trolls would benefit from this cheap shortcut.

“To achieve higher returns from settlements with less expense, practitioners of the copyright trolling business model have an incentive to pursue settlements from the ISP subscribers identified through subpoenas to ISPs, even where the subscriber is not necessarily the infringer,” EFF writes.

EFF: Oversight is Key

The precedents set in the RIAA vs. Verizon and Charter cases are key to protect these subscribers. They require rightsholders to file a proper lawsuit, instead of obtaining personal details through a simplified process.

This oversight is important, EFF says, as in previous lawsuits filed via the proper route, courts have rejected subpoenas because there was no evidence that the infringing IP address was used by the person who paid the ISP bills.

For example, in the Cobbler case, the Court of Appeal ruled that since several people can use the same Internet connection, rightsholders must present more than just an IP address to make their case. The DMCA subpoena procedure removes this check, EFF notes.

“Breaking with the long-established precedents of Verizon and Charter by permitting copyright holders to issue §512(h) subpoenas to ISPs who simply transmit data would bypass an important mechanism of court oversight and invite more coercive settlement demands against internet subscribers,” EFF concludes.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals will now review the arguments before deciding how the DMCA should be interpreted. It’s clear that the stakes are significant for all parties involved.

—

A copy of EFF’s amicus curiae brief, for which the paper versions were filed at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on January 3, is available here (pdf).

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

The United States Trade Representative (USTR) published its annual “Out-of-Cycle Review of Notorious Markets” a few hours ago.

The non-exhaustive list includes dozens of sites and services linked to piracy or counterfeiting activity.

The report is largely based on input from copyright industry groups, including the RIAA and MPA. Platforms detailed in recommendations filed late last year, are meant to serve as ‘prominent and illustrative examples’ without the USTR drawing any legal conclusions.

Complex Ecosystem & Familiar Names

The review acknowledges that rightsholders described a complex piracy ecosystem, one that goes beyond traditional websites with technology companies and services also playing a role. Those include domain registries and registrars, search engines, reverse proxies, payment processors, and hosting companies.

Many third-party intermediaries were nominated in last year’s submissions but despite the mentions, the USTR hasn’t included many in its final overview. This will be welcomed by the i2Coalition, which previously cautioned against blurring the piracy lines.

Overall, the latest list includes many familiar names, some of which have been listed for well over a decade. The Pirate Bay makes an expected appearance, alongside fellow torrent sites 1337x, TorrentGalaxy, RuTracker, and YTS.

The listed torrent sites are identical to those listed in last year’s report. The same applies to ‘cyberlockers’, which include Krakenfiles and Rapidgator. The mentioned publishing sites, LibGen and Sci-Hub, didn’t change either.

The e-commerce platforms also remain completely unchanged in the latest report. While the USTR sees some positive developments in this industry, Baidu Wangpan, DHgate, Pinduoduo, Shopee, and others remain listed.

New Additions to the List

There are some shakeups in the video game scene, however, with Fitgirl-Repacks and Unknowncheats as new additions. Both sites were flagged by the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) last October.

“FitGirl-Repacks, often abbreviated to ‘fitgirl’ is a well-known ‘repacking’ site that provides access to compressed versions of unauthorized and pirated versions of video games,” the USTR notes.

USTR about Fitgirl
 

There’s also a new streamripper, Y2Mate, thanks to a nomination by the RIAA. The site replaces ssyoutube.com, which was taken off the list.

The list of newcomers is completed by hosting provider Virtual Systems and two streaming services, MagisTV and Hianime. The latter replaces Aniwatch, which was taken down following the demise of the Fmovies piracy ring last summer.

USTR Applauds Successes

The Fmovies case is mentioned in detail by the USTR, described as one of the major piracy successes in 2024. This takedown was carried out by Vietnamese authorities, with key input from U.S. rightsholders and authorities.

“In Vietnam, the Hanoi Police collaborated with U.S. Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) International Computer Hacking and Intellectual Property (ICHIP) program, and the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) to shut down the site Fmovies and associated piracy sites in July and August 2024,” USTR notes.

Other positive developments include the conviction of the operator of BestBuyIPTV in Vietnam, Brazil’s seventh installment of anti-piracy “Operation 404”, and the Italian-led IPTV crackdown “Operation Taken Down“.

Almost Success: Cuevana

Finally, there is one site that deserves a special mention; Cuevana. This brand has been around for many years as new versions typically come online when others are taken offline.

The USTR’s report now lists Cuevana.biza after being nominated by the movie industry. This is somewhat unusual, as the site announced a voluntary shutdown a few weeks ago, citing pressure from the MPA and ACE. Purportedly, Cuevana was offering to sign over its domain names.

This shutdown never came to fruition, however. A message currently displayed on the site’s front page says that ACE merely sent an automated reply to Cuevana’s outreach, but didn’t respond otherwise. A follow-up reportedly remains unanswered too.

“In the last message, we kindly asked for the information to be passed on to the person in charge, but they again have not responded to us,” Cuevana.biz writes.

“I don’t know if the intention is to let us continue with the sites, but a week ago we should have already delivered one of the domains they requested..,” the site’s message adds.

Message for the MPA
 

Whether the message is sincere is hard to gauge. Technically, Cuevana could’ve put up a static page displaying this notice, instead of keeping the site running. But it’s worth pointing out anyway.

Perhaps it will result in another ‘positive development’, which the USTR can highlight in next year’s version of the notorious markets report.

—

A copy of the USTR’s 2024 Review of Notorious Markets is available here (pdf). The full overview also includes offline markets.

A list of highlighted sites and online services, including those listed for counterfeiting, is included below. The sites mentioned are categorized by TorrentFreak for clarity purposes and listed below.

Torrent Sites

– 1337X
– RuTracker
– The Pirate Bay
– TorrentGalaxy
– YTS.mx

File-Hosting/Cyberlockers

– 1fichier
– Krakenfiles
– Rapidgator
– Savefrom

E-Commerce

– Baidu Wangpan
– Bukalapak
– DHgate
– Indiamart
– Pinduoduo
– Shopee
– Taobao

PaaS

– 2embed
– Streamtape
– WHMCS Smarters

Advertising

– Avito

Streaming /IPTV

– Aniwatch
– BestBuyIPTV
– Cuevana3
– Fmovies
– GenIPTV
– Hianime (new)
– MagisTV (new)
– Pelisplus
– Shabakaty
– Spider
– VegaMovies

Hosting/Infrastructure

– Amaratu
– DDoS-Guard
– FlokiNET
– Squitter
– Virtual Systems (new)

Social Media

– VK.
– WeChat
Gaming

– NSW2U
– Firgirl-Repacks (new)
– Unknowncheats (new)

Music

– SSYouTube
– Y2Mate (new)

Publishing

– Libgen
– Sci-Hub

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

 Dynamic injunctions for tackling live sports piracy were crafted in the UK by the Premier League and first authorized by the High Court of England and Wales in 2017.

Football Association Premier League Ltd v British Telecommunications Plc & Ors compelled the UK’s major ISPs to block specific servers providing illicit match streams into the UK, with flexibility built-in by design.

In the years that followed, continuous fine-tuning set the legal standard for others to follow. Years of development work in conjunction with anti-piracy partner Friend MTS provided for sophisticated dynamic blocking of pirate IPTV services. That opened up new opportunities to support broadcasters and sports leagues developing their own live blocking programs overseas, with Canada a notable example.

Italy Preferred to Tread its Own Path

When Italy passed new law in 2023 in support of its now-infamous ‘Piracy Shield’ blocking system, the decision to go with a whole new anti-piracy platform was, at least on face value, somewhat baffling.

On one hand, the Premier League can be seen as a rival of top-tier Italian league Serie A; yet on the other, they share the same opponent in the fight against piracy. With anti-piracy coalitions also showing success right now, the theory made sense; after a year of blunders and controversy, little else did.

In an interview published Monday, Chris White, Chief Architect at Friend MTS, recalled last year’s football season as having a little more tension than usual.

Not If – When Disaster Strikes

“This summer the broadcast industry held its breath as news came out about overblocking by Italy’s new anti-piracy platform Piracy Shield, which is managed by AGCOM, the country’s communications regulator,” White said.

“Nobody wants to be responsible for blocking legitimate online services, damaging brands and impacting revenues.”

White was likely referring to the controversial blocking of Cloudflare and an unknown number of its customers’ websites, due to a Cloudflare IP address being wrongfully placed on the Piracy Shield system.

Despite that event ticking all three of the above boxes, there was no sign of public reflection on what could be learned from the experience. Instead, AGCOM declared war on Cloudflare and Serie A dragged the cloud provider into a lawsuit.

More Restraint, Increased Scrutiny

The above took place to a background of legal amendments to authorize more aggressive blocking and punishments for the tech industry for failing to engage in the blocking program. With rightsholders reportedly free to block with even less oversight than before, visible action to prevent history from repeating itself was notable only by its absence.

Moving forward, White said, the general threat of overblocking and its consequences should lead to a more considered approach.

“As the industry digests this risk, we expect to see more restraint and increased scrutiny about automated solutions and a shift towards blocking services with proven accuracy and industry-proven monitoring tech,” he explained.

“More importantly, we now need to make a concerted effort to counter the controversy by educating the industry about how effective blocking has been over the last seven years. We support many big name and lesser known broadcasters, streamers and sports leagues such as UEFA in effective blocking that is protecting the value of rights and revenues, and have done so for numerous years without issue.

“This is achieved through best-in-class monitoring and forensically accurate technologies to ensure that any targets won’t cause collateral damage on legitimate services.”

The Serie A and Friend MTS Partnership

If the quote above sounds a like a sales pitch, the timing is about right. In January 2022, Friend MTS confirmed a three-season deal with Serie A to combat piracy via its “field-leading global monitoring services” which provide “real-time identification of illegal streams of live Lega Serie A content…”

The three-year deal was actually a three-year extension, one that marked a decade-long Serie A partnership with Friend MTS. Whether that relationship will continue is unclear, but if Serie A already enjoys blocking accuracy thanks to Friend MTS, why did Cloudflare and then later Google both get blocked by Piracy Shield?

All we know is that AGCOM publicly blamed DAZN for both ‘blunders’ and on the Friend MTS website, DAZN isn’t mentioned as one of the company’s partners.

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

 The data for our weekly download chart is estimated by TorrentFreak, and is for informational and educational reference only.

Downloading content without permission is copyright infringement. These torrent download statistics are only meant to provide further insight into piracy trends. All data are gathered from public resources.

This week we have two newcomers on the list. “Wicked” is the most shared title.

The most torrented movies for the week ending on January 06 are:

Note: We also publish an updating archive of all the list of weekly most torrented movies lists.

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 Less than a year has passed since Italy officially implemented the ‘Piracy Shield‘ system that aims to thwart live sports streaming piracy.

Since February the system has blocked access to thousands of IP-addresses and domain names associated with unauthorized broadcasts.

This massive blocking operation is seen as a major success by the authorities and many participating rightsholders. As time passed, however, its weaknesses also became painfully obvious.

In addition to effective blockades, there were multiple reports of overblocking, where the anti-piracy system blocked access to Google Drive, Cloudflare, and other legitimate sites and services. Meanwhile, calls for more transparency and accountability were growing.

Piracy Shield Expansion

The authorities haven’t been sitting still since the ‘Piracy Shield’ launch. In addition to technical tweaks and improvements, expanding its reach was of particular interest. In October, for example, an amendment was approved to compel VPNs and DNS services to comply with blocking orders too.

This expansion was unofficially confirmed at the Court of Milan which ruled that Cloudflare has to block Piracy Shield targets across all applicable services.

In the coming year, it’s expected that the ‘Piracy Shield’ legal framework (Law 93/23) will be further updated following a public consultation. AGCOM, the organization in charge of the blocking system, announced as much in its annual report last month.

“As known, in fact, Law No. 93/23 further expanded the scope of the Authority’s action by strengthening its functions for a more effective and timely countering of piracy actions online with reference to all events broadcast live on the network,” AGCOM wrote.

“To this end, the Authority will proceed, after public consultation, with the necessary amendments to the Regulations […] and with the technical activities of updating and implementing the live blocking platform (Piracy Shield) functionality to achieve the objectives set by the law.”

From the annual report

Piracy Shield for Movie Premieres?

AGCOM’s comments suggest that more sports and other live TV content may eventually receive ‘Piracy Shield’ protection. A public consultation is planned to discuss these and other potential expansions.

This is music to the ears of local anti-piracy group FAPAV, which represents major film organizations and companies, including Italian branches of Netflix, Universal, Warner Bros, and Walt Disney.

FAPAV President Bagnoli Rossi recently applauded AGCOM for the rollout of the ‘Piracy Shield’, describing it as a fundamental anti-piracy tool. At the same time, he expressed a wish to expand its scope even further, covering ‘non-live’ movies as well.

“We hope that the new public consultation will be opened as soon as possible, aimed at extending the timeliness of intervention to other audiovisual content provided for by law, including for example first-run films and non-sports live television broadcasts, a measure that the sector is waiting for,” Rossi says.

Slippery Slope?

Put differently, FAPAV would like to make the ‘Piracy Shield’ the defacto blocking standard for a wider variety of valuable copyrighted content.

This is not a trivial comment. It suggests that a 30-minute blocking window, which was written into law specifically to help protect rightsholders of live broadcasts, might be expanded to non-live content.

This is a controversial suggestion; ‘instant’ blockades are more susceptible to errors than measures ordered following a proper judicial review. While that may be acceptable collateral for live content, the stakes change when the same blocking technology is used more broadly.

While AGCOM hasn’t specifically mentioned the inclusion of non-live content, it’s clear that rightsholders will argue in favor of this during the upcoming consultation. That by itself, will be plenty of fuel for further discussion, controversy, and drama in 2025.

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 Offering pirate streaming services is a serious offense in the UK, where several people have received multi-year prison sentences.

Last Friday, another seller was added to this growing list. At York Crown Court, 41-year-old Sunny Kanda from Wheatley, Halifax, was sentenced to two years in prison for selling modified Fire Sticks that provided access to pirate IPTV streams.

The sentencing doesn’t come as a surprise, as Kanda pleaded guilty to three charges; violating the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988, the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, and Fraud Act 2006.

£108,000 (Lost) Revenue

The ‘criminal’ proceeds from the Fire Stick operation were estimated at £108,000 over an 18-month period. The victims were legitimate streaming providers such as Sky, BT Sport, Disney+ and Netflix, who purportedly lost revenue as the result of the pirate sales.

The information provided above was shared in a press release issued by National Trading Standards and anti-piracy group FACT, who are both pleased with the outcome. They hope it will deter others from starting similar criminal operations.

“Today’s sentence is an important reminder to all those who buy and sell TV firesticks that crime does not pay – it breaches copyright law and we encourage people to report suspected cases to the Citizens Advice consumer service,” a Trading Standards spokesperson said on Friday.

The press release was picked up by several reputable news outlets including the BBC, which reported all the major talking points. They include an undercover FACT investigator joining a private, 3,900 member Facebook group where “KD Streams” was sold, to make a test purchase of a pirate Fire Stick.

The official communication is accurate, but it also leaves out many details that could put this criminal conviction in context.

Rebrand & Resell

Those who think that the defendant was running an entire IPTV operation are wrong. In a Reddit post from 2020, Kanda showed an interest in rebranding an APK, which could then be used to resell subscriptions. That’s how many ‘hobbyist’ resellers first get involved.

Such rebranded apps can be used in conjunction with dedicated IPTV platform software such as OTTRUN, with the user bringing their own service from elsewhere. These subscriptions ‘credits’ are often bought by resellers in bulk from yet another provider, such as the IPTV Reseller Hub.

The prices below show that there’s plenty of room for profit, as plans are sold to customers at much higher prices.

Kanda, possibly with help from others, likely combined services like these to sell his modified Fire Sticks with a significant markup. These customers included a FACT investigator, which led to his arrest and conviction.

Small Cog in the Wheel

How many customers the operation had wasn’t made public. However, simple math shows that £108,000 results in an average of 600 customers who each paid £10 per month for the 18 months that were mentioned. At least one former user of the service claims to have paid £15 per month, which could theoretically reduce the average to 400.

There is no doubt that Kanda broke the law. However, it’s important to note that he’s far from a mastermind in the grander pirate IPTV business.

The man doesn’t come across as a typical ‘criminal’ either. Publicly available information suggests that he has been gainfully employed for years, has a steady relationship, and occasionally raised money for charity.

That said, by willingly operating as a pirate IPTV reseller, he faced all the risk, which resulted in a multi-year prison sentence.

While rightsholders are happy with the criminal conviction, the fact remains that the criminal masterminds who rake in millions a month from these schemes remain out there. Their business wasn’t impacted, and they will simply move on to the next ‘reseller’.

After which this sad cycle will repeat itself.

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 In January 2017, Alexa data indicated that The Pirate Bay was the most popular torrent site on the internet. In July that same year, the notorious torrent site entered the Alexa Top 100 with the 99th most popular domain on the internet.

TPB had been there before but following a disastrous period of downtime in 2014, many users simply went elsewhere. That had a significant effect on the site’s traffic and its coveted Top 100 ranking.

The extraordinary background to traffic data now being reported by SimilarWeb was likely affected by downtime too. However, seven years on from The Pirate Bay’s misfortune, the piracy landscape is more complex, enforcement has increased, yet the ecosystem somehow appears to recover more easily than before.

Very Big Numbers

As SimilarWeb’s data shows, HiAnime.to received 331.6 million visits in November 2024. For any site today that’s a very big number yet the data shows the site received fewer visits than the previous month. In October 2024, HiAnime received 364 million visits, 32 million more than November and a remarkable 62 million increase on September’s traffic.

Unprecedented….

With more than three times the traffic of legal competitor Crunchyroll, HiAnime is obviously a priority target for Japan’s anime producers; but if only it stopped there.

According to the data, HiAnime outranks GitHub in the United States overall, and both Peacock TV and Disney Plus in the United States’ ‘Streaming and Online TV’ category. Outranking Disney Plus globally can’t be ruled out.

As a caveat, we should mention that this data only includes website visits, not traffic that goes to the associated streaming apps.

[Illegal] Global player

Roughly 40% of the site’s visits are from users in the United States, four in ten aged between 18 and 24. Over 80% of the site’s social media traffic is reportedly fueled by YouTube, although the majority of overall visits (76%) are direct. How the site managed to pull in so much traffic is extraordinary in itself.

The Secret Sauce

The most significant enforcement action of 2024 saw anti-piracy coalition ACE take down FMovies and several closely linked additional sites, together accounting for over a billion visits each year. One of the sites taken offline was Aniwave.to, a relatively new site but one already enjoying a significant amount of traffic.

The secret sauce that enabled Aniwave to become so popular so quickly, isn’t exactly a secret. Aniwave wasn’t a new site, it was simply a rebranding of another anime giant called 9anime, which previously ‘shut down’ due to alleged legal issues.

So when 9anime/Aniwave was shut down by ACE/MPA so dramatically in Vietnam late August/early September, HiAnime was waiting in the wings to scoop up the traffic. Whether one cuts it this way or that, that traffic was effectively generated by itself.

Chameleons Eat Themselves, Grow Stronger

Compounding the incestuous relationship between these chameleon platforms are events dating back to summer 2023. Under pressure from ACE, the owner of a site called Zoro.to handed over the site’s domains to ACE/MPA. Shortly after, Zoro.to was suddenly “sold to new owners”, who immediately rebranded the world’s then-largest pirate site to Aniwatch.

When Aniwatch came under pressure from ACE in September 2023, the subsequent response was similarly reminiscent of Grand Theft Auto. On a five-star wanted level, the site pulled into a paint shop, received a complete respray, before reappearing as HiAnime; stars wiped clean and traffic intact.

A month after the big shutdown in Vietnam, with HiAnime pulling in extraordinary traffic, ACE was observed in hot pursuit once again.

How this will eventually play out seems almost inevitable; the big question is whether outranking Disney Plus globally comes before or after.

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 Japanese manga comics have always been popular on pirate sites, whereas other categories have seen their growth stall. In contrast, manga piracy continues to grow.

This unauthorized activity is a thorn in the side of publishers, who are increasingly fighting back against this piracy activity, wherever it takes place in the world.

Japan’s largest publisher Shueisha has taken a variety of legal actions, also in U.S. courts. The company obtained several DMCA subpoenas hoping to expose the operators of dozens of pirate sites such as Manganato.com, mangakoma01.net, truyenqqvn.com, and manga-zip.is, for example.

These cases are filed in the U.S. because the manga publisher requests information from third-party intermediaries such as Cloudflare, PayPal, Visa, and Google.

One Piece ‘Pirates’ on X

This week the manga mogul was back in court, requesting a DMCA subpoena from another American intermediary, Elon Musk’s social media platform X. The application targets the X accounts of ‘spoilerplus’ and ‘mangaraw’, which stand accused of repeatedly sharing ‘One Piece’ content without permission.

These are not random X accounts that incidentally shared pirated material. On the contrary, they are linked to well-known pirate sites that have been targeted by similar efforts before.

Spoilerplus and Mangaraw domain names were listed in a broad DMCA subpoena that targeted Cloudflare last year. Not much later, these domains also showed up in a separate request in a California federal court, where Google, Visa, and PayPal were asked to provide information on the alleged operators.

The latter information request is tied to legal developments in Japan, where Shueisha aims to bring the ‘anonymous’ operators to justice. The status of the Japanese process is unclear, as the manga publisher continues to seek information, including sources like X.

X DMCA Subpoena

The request for a DMCA subpoena, filed at a Californian court this week, specifically seeks information on twitter.com/spoilerplus and twitter.com/mangaraw_jp.

Mangaraw

Shueisha previously sent a notice to X, asking it to remove both accounts. While X disabled all the highlighted posts that are tied to allegedly infringing material, the Mangaraw account is still online today, linking to the mangaraw01.net website.

Letter to X
 

Both accounts posted infringing ‘One Piece’ material according to Shueisha. According to a declaration from attorney Hiroyuki Nakajima, these posts were made by “anonymous internet users” without authorization from the rightsholders.

Japanese Lawsuit & Free Speech?

The DMCA subpoena request doesn’t mention a potential lawsuit in Japan. However, the manga publisher stresses that it needs all information tied to these accounts to protect its rights.

While ‘anonymous’ users have previously been shielded by free speech rights under the First Amendment, the rights of copyright holders should carry more weight here, the request argues.

Shueisha specifically cited jurisprudence from a U.S. court which previously held that “to the extent that anonymity is used to mask copyright infringement […] it is unprotected by the First Amendment.”

In this case, the account holders are suspected infringers at the center of potential copyright litigation. That sets it apart from previous instances where the anonymous speech of Redditors was protected because they were merely seen as potential ‘witnesses’.

Email, IP-addresses, Access logs & More

The request for a DMCA subpoena has yet to be approved by the court but, absent any protest from X, that’s just a formality.

Shueisha already shared a list of all the details they would like to receive about the two X accounts. This includes names, phone numbers, email addresses, payment details, IP-addresses, and detailed access logs.

Requested information

Whether X has access to all this information has yet to be seen. And even if it has, it’s unclear how usable it is. Ostensibly, Shueisha’s previous attempts at Cloudflare, Google, PayPal, and Visa were not sufficient to identify all the culprits with certainty.

Update: There’s a separate DMCA request from Shogakukan looking for information on X user @WeET_COLLECTION (pdf).

—

A copy of Shueisha’s DMCA subpoena request at the California federal court and the associated paperwork is available here (1, 2, 3, 4).

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More than two-and-a-half years ago, a group of Israel-based TV companies entered a new phase of their multi-year war against the country’s most popular and resilient pirate sites.

Companies including United King Film Distribution, Keshet Broadcasting, Hot Telecommunications Systems, and Reshet Media, requested a broad injunction at a federal court in the United States. The targets were three popular and highly-resilient pirate streaming sites; Israel-tv.com, Israel.tv, and Sdarot.tv, at the time Israel’s most-visited pirate site.

Blocking orders previously obtained in Israel had failed to put the platforms out of business. In the United States, the companies simply requested three of the most oppressive injunctions ever seen in a piracy case, and surprisingly the court obliged.

All ISPs…and any other ISPs providing services in the United States shall block access to the Website at any domain address known today…or to be used in the future by the Defendants…by any technological means available on the ISPs’ systems.

The injunctions also prevented CDN providers, DNS providers, domain companies, advertising services, financial institutions, and payment processors, from doing any business with the sites, ever. This unprecedented overreach provoked a significant reaction from Cloudflare and soon after the injunction was withdrawn.

TV Companies Try Their Hand at the High Court in London

While the Holy Grail of site-blocking injunctions ultimately proved elusive, other measures detailed in redacted or sealed court filings were eventually sanctioned in the United States. The nature of the measures is unknown but after being deployed for the last two-and-a-half years, most likely at great expense, the job still isn’t done.

In today’s shape-shifting world of self-resurrecting pirate sites, and clone sites that effectively mimic fallen originals, it’s difficult to say whether the various Sdarot-branded platforms online today are connected to the original or not. Israel TV, on the other hand, is an IPTV subscription platform with a style of business that’s more difficult to mimic, at least convincingly so.

The TV companies and the site are by now sworn enemies. The former doggedly refuses to give up and the latter bluntly refuses to give in. News of action at the High Court in London therefore suggests a new battleground is about to emerge.

Filed on December 24, 2024, the action sees United King Film Distribution, Keshet Broadcasting, Hot Telecommunications Systems, and Reshet Media, facing off against the UK’s largest internet service providers; British Telecommunications, EE, Plusnet, Sky UK, Talktalk, and Virgin Media Limited.

With no pirate sites mentioned at this stage but all other tell-tale signs present, this is unmistakably an application for a blocking injunction under Section 97A of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

An Interesting Coincidence

What the Israeli companies have in mind isn’t entirely clear beyond the basics, and details are unlikely to arrive in the public domain for quite some time. Yet coincidentally or not, during the last few weeks an unusual listing appeared on freelancing platform, Upwork, that may shine some light on current planning.

Placed by a small IT company reportedly doing business in New York, which to date has spent $196K on 261 hires (67 active), the listing requests very specific information of the type typically required as part of a S97 application.

Upwork Listing

The item listed as ‘Task #2’ also fits neatly into a hypothetical scenario of this exercise being connected to an application for a blocking injunction. The TV company applicants have already shown considerable determination in their pursuit of Moonpay.

On reading the text, whoever won the contract for the work seems to have been advised that a particular outcome is a necessity; i.e this report should include a more specific transfer to their processing domain called billnet domain and more importantly to show that billnet always transfers to moonpay.com

In the unlikely event that a Section 97A order under copyright law would also instruct the blocking of a payment provider, showing that all of an infringer’s business can be attributed to a single processor might be quite useful. The text at the end (emphasis ours) may or may not be a reference to that but if such an order was made under copyright law, it would be the first of its type, at least as far as we’re aware.

Significantly Easier Than the U.S.

For the last 14 years or so, rightsholders have obtained blocking injunctions against broadly the same ISPs, hoping to reduce the availability of pirated content in the UK. The major Hollywood studios, major record labels, and to a lesser extent publishers, are adamant that site-blocking works. Yet in most months, new blocks targeting hundreds of domains are urgently pushed through in response to the latest pirate countermeasures.

The ISPs’ familiarity with this process is a big plus for the Israeli companies. Unless there’s a glaring issue that needs to be addressed, it’s likely they’ll receive no opposition from the ISPs; after all, several are TV companies who also wish to restrict infringement.

If recent history is any barometer, the ISPs may not even attend court. In that respect, they’ll probably have something in common with Israel TV.

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

 Ever since the existence of online piracy first hit the mainstream, the phenomenon has been described using words such as massive or vast.

Setting the bar so high means that as far as basic descriptions go, the last quarter-century has always had a huge piracy problem. Only when focusing on a relatively small aspect of the piracy market and then pausing to look up, does the true scale come into focus.

When Italy officially launched its Piracy Shield platform on February 1, 2024, the stated aim was to eliminate IPTV piracy on home turf. Almost literally, it transpires, since the majority of all blocking in 2024 has been carried out by broadcasters such as DAZN and Sky, to protect top-tier football league Serie A.

Controversies litter the past eleven months. Cloudflare and Google were both wrongfully targeted as enthusiasm to prevent piracy took precedence over the interests of internet users, and previously promised transparency gave way to almost complete unaccountability. What can or will be done to prevent further overblocking in 2025 remains to be seen but, thankfully, we can offer a little more transparency right now.

Piracy Shield: The State of Blocking 2024

Telecoms regulator AGCOM has just released its 2024 annual report (pdf) and at 200-pages long it’s a hefty read. In respect of Piracy Shield it offers little enlightenment. The report states that from February 1 to May 26, 2024, rightsholders requested and obtained 13 precautionary measures in respect of the illicit transmission of live sports.

In the same period, 18,879 fully qualified domain names (FQDN) and 4,006 IP addresses were blocked by Piracy Shield.

Data provided to TorrentFreak by an anonymous source is more comprehensive. The data claims to include all IP addresses blocked by the system until just a few days ago, more than 6,900 in total.

The number of fully qualified domain names, meaning domain names and all subdomains where they exist, is significantly larger, almost 17,500.

Piracy Shield: IP Addresses Blocked (reported locations per ipinfo.io)

Using geo-location tools provided by ipinfo.io, it’s immediately apparent that servers located in Europe itself account for the majority of IP addresses blocked by Piracy Shield. How many of these locations indicate an originating source of pirated streams is beyond the scope of this article, but it’s clear that it’s relatively uncommon for distant IP addresses to service Italy directly.

Reasons for that include a preference for local datacenters based on performance, onward distribution of streams for use by local suppliers, and in theory a reduced risk of IP addresses ending up on Italy’s blocklist and others elsewhere in Europe. Success in that respect seems patchy.

Europe and Other Regions Closer to Home

Moving more closely towards Italy reveals that IP addresses have been blocked in almost all countries in Europe, with notable absentees Denmark, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Greece.

With some of their name labels almost completely obscured by location markers, Italy’s northern neighbors appear to be among those causing the country the biggest headaches.

Piracy Shield: Closer to Home

The focus box shows that 196 IP addresses have been blocked in Italy itself. This is interesting for a number of reasons. In general, most countries limit their blocking to overseas services/locations because in theory, blocking is a last resort, useful when pirate services are beyond the jurisdiction of national police and the courts. With virtually no restrictions on which IP addresses are placed on Italy’s blacklist, nothing is a surprise.

The Badlands of Western Europe

While 196 IP addresses is normally quite a lot, for Piracy Shield that isn’t a particularly large number. When compared to other European countries with coastlines on the North Sea, it fades into insignificance.

Piracy Shield: Northern Neighbors

Considering that the Netherlands, Germany, and France all have established domestic site-blocking programs, it’s notable that these countries appear to be among the major exporters of pirate streams. That being said, the Netherlands appearing at the top of the list isn’t a surprise. In general online piracy terms, not much has changed in 20 years, except for the method used to deliver the content.

At the heart of Europe, Germany in second place isn’t a major shock either. However, given attitudes to copyright elsewhere in the EU, other locations might be a more logical, if not less practical choice, with the same applying to France. Romania’s position seems about right; the country has always had great internet, is known to be favored by some suppliers, with rightsholders still complaining about enforcement options in the background.

Given the volume of entities in the list and the shifting nature of domain names, more time is needed to process those, so we’ll return to this topic very soon.

In the meantime, the top 10 countries blocked by Piracy Shield worldwide in 2024 (IP addresses only)

Piracy Shield: Top 10 Blocked Countries 2024 (by IP address only)

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In 2017, a new global anti-piracy coalition formed under the umbrella of the Motion Picture Association (MPA).

The Alliance for Entertainment and Creativity (ACE) bundled the powers and pockets of dozens of entertainment companies, and were joined by many more in the years that followed.

While skeptics may have dismissed the launch of yet another anti-piracy group, ACE was and is a grand success. The group has industry members and law enforcement contacts all over the globe, allowing it to pool intelligence and take action more effectively than ever before.

2024: A Transformative Year

The past year has been eventful for ACE on many fronts. The Alliance waved goodbye to its main boss, Jan Van Voorn, who left to work on a new IP-protection startup, IP-House. While his expertise will be missed, several key hires aim to fill the gap.

In June, Larissa Knapp was announced as the alliance’s new Global Chief of Content Protection. Knapp brings a wealth of experience from her 27 years at the FBI. As one of the highest-ranking officials, she managed over 2,000 personnel.

Other hires announced this year also bring much to the table, including former Assistant U.S. Attorney Marissa Bostick, who also served as Deputy Director for the Amazon’s Counterfeit Crimes Unit. As the MPA’s new Head of Global Litigation, Bostick will also oversee international litigation related to ACE activity.

Bryan Willett, a former FBI agent, is another key addition to the team. He will serve as the MPA’s VP Content Protection Enforcement for the Americas region, where he will develop and oversee ACE’s internet enforcement strategy, aiming to further curb online piracy.

2024: Landmark Shutdowns

While expanding the team is crucial for the future of ACE, the Alliance’s core objective of shutting down piracy operations remains unchanged. And 2024 saw no shortage of accomplishments on that front.

Looking back, the shutdown of the Fmovies piracy ring, together with Vietnamese authorities, stands out. This impacted many popular pirate brands, including Aniwave, Soap2dayx2, Zoroxtv, Fboxz, Animesuge, Cinezone, and many others.

These sites, which were wiped out overnight, collectively received billions of visits per year. The Vietnamese authorities are prosecuting the alleged mastermind of the Fmovies operation, which may bring more details to the forefront in the coming year.

There were many other key shutdowns in the past year too. In January, ACE shut down a football piracy streaming operation, in May IPTV sellers had their domains seized, Animeflix was pushed offline in July, and in September Egypt’s largest pirate site ‘Laroza’ was toppled.

Toward the end of the year, popular anime site Animefenix shut down ‘voluntarily’ citing legal pressure. The same happened to Braflix a few weeks earlier. Neither site mentioned ACE in their farewell messages but since both domains now redirect to ACE’s “Watch Legally” page, it’s not hard to guess where the pressure came from.

The above is just a selection of ACE’s actions. In total, several hundreds of domains were either seized or shut down by the group over the past twelve months. And there are no signs that enforcement activity will slow down anytime soon.

2025: Fresh & Familiar Targets

Just before Christmas, MPA and ACE went back to court, with Larissa Knapp requesting several DMCA subpoenas at a California federal court. Through the subpoenas, ACE wants Cloudflare and the .to domain registry (Tonic) to share information related to numerous domain names.

“This would include the individuals’ names, physical addresses, IP addresses, telephone numbers, e-mail addresses, payment information, account updates and account history,” Knapp writes.

These targets are all related to pirate streaming sites, services, or apps, some with dozens of millions of monthly visits. Anime site Anitaku is the most prominent target, with more than 158 million visits in November. Other sites like Gimy, Aniworld, and Faselhds also attract significant traffic.

The subpoenas target a total of 39 pirate streaming domains. ACE and the MPA hope that, through their requests for information, they can learn more about the identities and whereabouts of the operators.

Some high traffic targets (full list here)

This is not the first time that some of these sites have been targeted by ACE. An older Anitaku domain was listed in a subpoena a few months ago. While new uploads to the site were stalled recently, it remains online.

These subpoenas are standard practice by now. In several cases, site operators try to avoid being identified by using false information. However, history has also shown that these efforts can pay off.

In any case, the list of fresh targets shows what MPA and ACE’s priorities are. It’s clear that they are pushing full steam ahead with their enforcement efforts in the new year.

…

—

A full list of all targeted domains is available below. Some of the associated paperwork can be found here (1,2,3).

– vidsrc.to
– aniworld.to
– animeworld.so
– 1tamilblasters.dad
– streamblasters.pm
– chinaq.tv
– dramasq.tw
– dramasq.com
– politicslovers.com
– linkkf.net
– bearbit.co
– tugaflix.best
– cb01.forsale
– altadefinizione01.living
– altadefinizione.democrat
– katmoviehd.fi
– lordhd.mov
– kukaj.me
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– castledownload.com

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend  

 Online piracy is a constant headache for copyright holders; one that’s particularly hard to beat.

Because those who run pirate sites often ignore takedown requests, copyright holders began targeting search engines and other online platforms that inadvertently help users to find pirated content.

Typically, copyright holders outsource this work to third-party companies that scan the web for links to pirated material. These companies then contact search engines, like Google, to request their removal.

Google has become a primary target for these requests, having recently processed its 10 billionth URL removal request.

Link-Busters: The Takedown Champion of 2024

These removal requests are not new. The process has been going on for well over a decade, fueled by reports from thousands of rightsholders. This year, however, one company stood out far beyond the rest in a way we’ve never witnessed before.

A few days ago, Link-Busters flagged its two billionth pirate URL to Google.

This comes less than half a year after it reached the one billion milestone, and currently it’s sending takedowns for more than 250 million URLs per month.

At this rate, it is no surprise that Link-Busters is the most prolific takedown sender at Google. In fact, it’s good for well over half of all takedown requests the search engine received since this summer. That’s something we’ve never seen before.

Publishers Fight Piracy

Link-Busters’ record-breaking numbers reveal that its notices are almost exclusively sent on behalf of publishing companies. The rise of shadow libraries, combined with the threat of AI scraping, has made these companies very active on the anti-piracy front.

Link-Busters clients (selection)
 

Websites such as Z-Library and Anna’s Archive allow the public to download free books. These books can also be used for AI training. To prevent this, publishers try to make these sites unfindable in search results.

Looking at Link-Busters’ most-targeted domains, we see three Anna’s Archive domains on top, followed by a series of localized Z-Library domains. These six domains are already good for over 340 million reported URLs.

Link-Busters Top Domains and Top Rightsholders
 

The table also shows the top rightsholders working with the anti-piracy company. These are all publishing companies, with Penguin Random House and HarperCollins clearly standing out, with a billion takedowns combined. Other popular request senders include Taylor & Francis, Simon and Schuster, and Hachette.

‘Better Than All The Rest’

It’s clear that Link-Busters is more ‘active’ than most competing takedown outfits, but this conclusion deserves some nuance. For one, many of the reported domains are mirrors, which show the same pirated books and articles duplicated across different URLs.

Additionally, shadow libraries generally have a larger amount of content indexed than pirate sites specializing in video content. That’s simply because there are more titles available.

However, various online testimonials suggest that publishing companies are quite satisfied with Link-Busters’ service.

“Benchmarked against the competition, Link-Busters were better at finding infringements, responded faster and did not suffer from ‘false positives’,” Penguin Random House notes.

Taylor & Francis, meanwhile, notices that Link-Busters helped to process “at least 400% more removals than previous years.”

Shadow Libraries Expand

It’s clear that Link-Busters is making an impact and that many publishers are content. While the billions of takedowns prevented some people from ending up at pirate sites, it didn’t stop them from operating.

Despite pressure from a U.S. criminal prosecution, Z-Library remains online. The site has just announced that it will close the book on a rather successful year. With over 36 million user profiles and 250 million daily reading recommendations, it continues to serve a massive audience.

Interestingly, the site continues to grow its presence off the web as well. Z-Library closes the year with 876,477 users of its desktop application, which more than doubled in a year.

Anna’s Archive, meanwhile, continued to grow as well. After ending last year with 25 million indexed books and 99 million academic papers, it now has access to more than 36 million books and over 106 million papers.

All in all, it’s safe to say that Link-Busters has a lot more link busting to do in the new year. At the current rate, it will send a few billion DMCA takedown requests to Google in 2025.

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RIP Matrix | Farewell my friend