As online piracy continued to cause headaches for South Korea, in 2023 key media entities formed the Video Copyright Protection Council.
The VCPC coalition adopted a unified “stronger together” strategy for operational efficiencies and greater governmental leverage, swiftly putting its first target on notice with a criminal complaint and a $3.7 billion damages claim.
NunuTV / NooNooTV
Popular in the local market, streaming site NunuTV (or Noonootv based on domain name format) had been servicing tens of millions of visitors per month and was reportedly responsible for 1.5 billion views of pirated movies and TV shows.
With billions of dollars worth of damage allegedly suffered by legitimate platforms, NunuTV became a clear candidate for aggressive site-blocking measures. The authorities blocked domain after new domain but nothing seemed capable of significantly reducing the site’s popularity.
Coupled with a warning from the coalition, an announcement that the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, would create a new piracy investigation unit, in hindsight signaled the beginning of the end for NunuTV.
Less than two years after its launch in June 2021, the site announced that it would shut down on April 14, 2023, citing “outrageous” bandwidth costs and “pressure on the site from all directions.”
Site Down, Legal Subscribers Up, Hail Blocking
The site’s closure was cause for cautious celebration. In a July 2023 report published by subscription streaming platform Tving, a growing subscriber base was attributed to customer loyalty and the closure of NunuTV. In the United States, the tactics used against the site highlighted were seen as important.
After nominating the site for ‘notorious market’ status in 2022 (pdf), the MPA’s 2023 submission (pdf), attributed the site’s demise to the success of site blocking and the and the Ministry of Culture’s announcement regarding its investigation team..
Season 2: Surprisingly Short
In the background, the emergence of a new site just weeks after the disappearance of the first, had already prompted an announcement by the government.
Aggressive site blocking was back on the table, with blocks updated several times each day. It remained to be seen what other “strong measures” could be taken that hadn’t been tried before.
Quite quickly, however, the problem found its own solution.
“Hello, this is NunuTV Season 2. After careful consideration, the NunuTV Season 2 site is closed. Although it is a short period of time, we sincerely appreciate your interest.”
With over 1,300 domains containing “noonootv” registered and ready for use, copycat sites were always likely to be a problem. Yet, minus the features that made the original so popular, few if any could expect anything like the same success.
As is often the case with site resurrections, only those behind the original site could realistically deliver the same experience. Late last year, the chances of that happening collapsed in an instant.
Operator of NunuTV Arrested in South Korea
In November 2024, Korean authorities announced the shutdown of TVWIKI, a popular streaming piracy site with millions of users. A special unit under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism arrested the site’s alleged operator, who according to reports, was also behind streaming platform OKTOON.
A takedown notice hosted on GitHub revealed that the individual, identified only as ‘Person A’, was also the operator of NunuTV.
Concerns that the raids and arrest were an of elaborate hoax were soon dismissed by Korean authorities.
According to local news reports, law enforcement authorities seized assets worth 2.6 billion won (US$1.9m) including two luxury cars, and a total of 14 bitcoin.
Six months later, ‘Person A’ appeared before a court in South Korea to discover how his immediate future would be playing out.
Sentenced to 3 Years in Prison, $500K Fine
On May 26, Judge Koh Young-sik at the 9th Criminal Division of the Daejeon District Court, sentenced ‘Person A’ for offenses under the Copyright Act.
“The nature of the crime is bad because it systematically infringed on property rights over a long period of time for profit-making purposes such as obtaining advertising revenue,” Judge Koh said.
To avoid the effects of site blocking and other government action, Person A continued to operate using dozens of domains and overseas servers, including in the Dominican Republic and Paraguay. Virtual private networks (VPNs), overseas credit cards, and cryptocurrencies were also used in an effort to avoid being tracked down by investigators.
To obtain content from legal webtoon platforms, Person A reportedly obtained official accounts from an unspecified number of people before posting illegal copies online. A diagram supplied by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism provides an overview of the operation.
“Copyright crimes not only infringe on the copyright holder’s ability to generate revenue, but also discourage creative desire, ultimately hindering cultural development,” Judge Koh continued.
“In addition, the defendant admitted his wrongdoing, and his criminal record was taken into consideration when determining the sentence.”
For the illegal distribution of hundreds of thousands of copyrighted videos and webtoons via NunuTV, TVWiki, and OKTOON, the former pirate site operator was ordered to serve three years in prison and pay a fine of 700 million won (US$512K)
Odds of Evasion: Slim
Reports claim that NunuTV’s operator was “meticulous” in his efforts to remain anonymous but when local government and law enforcement agencies team up with international partners, that may not be enough. Person A was the target of a joint investigation by the Copyright Crime Scientific Investigation Unit of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, and the International Criminal Police Organization, better known as INTERPOL.
In January 2025, INTERPOL announced the signing of a memorandum of understanding and launch of the second phase of INTERPOL-Stop Online Piracy (I-SOP), an international collaborative anti-piracy project to crack down on illegal online distribution platforms.
The initiative receives funding from the Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST) (2.8 million euros) with support from the Korean National Police Agency.
In addition to the dismantling of NunuTV, successes during the first phase include the arrest of individuals behind P2P release group EVO.
From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.
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