‘Make Pay-Per-View Access to Boxing Events Free to Fight Piracy’
In recent years, rightsholders of major sports events have repeatedly complained that piracy of live sports is rising through the roof. They’ve called on lawmakers to tighten legislation and urged law enforcement to take the problem much more seriously. Last month, U.S. authorities took action by seizing several domain names of sports streaming site Streameast, which has millions of monthly users. The seizures were carried out by the...
That’s All Folks: KimCartoon’s 120m Visit Piracy Caper Ends in a DMCA Disaster
It has been a rough couple of weeks for people who love cartoons but prefer not to pay for them. The simultaneous disappearance of Aniwave and the connected Anix last week left a massive hole in the pirate market. The pair serviced at least one, and maybe as many as two, billion visits in the previous 12 months alone. While those platforms focused on Japanese anime, KimCartoon offered a much wider variety of cartoons. From decades-old...
Man Arrested for Sharing Copyright Infringing Nude Scenes Through Reddit
The web is riddled with copyright infringing content, ranging from full-length blockbuster films, through small music samples, to reposted celebrity photos on social media. Not all of these offenses are equally problematic. Law enforcement authorities may go after the operators of large-scale pirate sites or services, but posting short film clips without permission typically doesn’t lead to trouble. Sharing Nude Scenes of Reddit Last...
Internet Archive Loses Landmark E-Book Lending Copyright Appeal Against Publishers
In 2020, publishers Hachette, HarperCollins, John Wiley and Penguin Random House sued the Internet Archive (IA) for copyright infringement, equating its ‘Open Library’ to a pirate site. IA’s library is a non-profit organization that, among other things, scans physical books in-house so these can be lent out to patrons as e-books. This “Controlled Digital Lending” (CDL) practice allows for only one copy of a book to be lent at a time,...
UFC & MLB Join Pirate IPTV Blocking as Broadcasters Collaborate to Cut Costs
In June 2022, Canada’s Federal Court handed down a ‘dynamic’ blocking order to prevent live NHL games from being viewed via pirate IPTV streams. Obtained by companies including Rogers, Bell, The Sports Network, and Groupe TVA, the injunction was the first of its kind in Canada and had flexibility built-in by design. That was only the beginning and just like the UK and other countries in Europe, more applications resulted in more...
TorrentGalaxy is Back Online & Uploads Resume
For a torrent site, TorrentGalaxy is still a relative newcomer. The site is barely seven years of age while others have been around for over two decades. In that timespan, however, TorrentGalaxy secured a key place in the torrent ecosystem. Not only does it serve millions of users directly, its ‘release’ groups also distribute torrents across other popular sites, including The Pirate Bay and 1337x. This role has been challenged over...
