{"id":72023,"date":"2023-03-16T09:01:25","date_gmt":"2023-03-16T09:01:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/?p=72023"},"modified":"2023-03-16T09:01:25","modified_gmt":"2023-03-16T09:01:25","slug":"after-ace-shuts-down-streamzz-pirates-demand-refunds-but-get-zebras-instead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/?p=72023","title":{"rendered":"After ACE Shuts Down Streamzz, Pirates Demand Refunds But Get Zebras Instead"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/ace-gone.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/ace-gone.jpg\" alt=\"ace-aim\" width=\"270\" height=\"169\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-226831\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/ace-gone.jpg 977w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/ace-gone-18x12.jpg 18w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 270px) 100vw, 270px\"><\/a>As part of its relentless campaign to shut down as many pirate sites as possible, on Wednesday the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment reported yet another big win.<\/p>\n<p>The anti-piracy coalition\u2019s latest victim is Streamzz, a stream hosting platform that reportedly supplied over 75,000 movies and 15,000 TV episodes, which helped to fuel more than 60 pirate streaming sites.<\/p>\n<p>ACE says that a third of the site\u2019s seven million monthly visits can be attributed to users in Germany, where Streamzz itself was based. Germany is also the home of ACE member Constantin Film, a film production and distribution company that worked with the coalition to take Streamzz down.<\/p>\n<h2>ACE Celebrates Win, Streamzz Infuriates Users<\/h2>\n<p>In an announcement Wednesday, ACE chief Jan van Voorn said that the closure of Streamzz shows that the coalition is capable of targeting pirates no matter where they exist in the chain of supply. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe shutdown of Streamzz is fresh proof that no one in the content piracy ecosystem \u2013 whether they\u2019re a streaming service, video streaming host or anything in between \u2013 is above the law. We will target piracy services of various kinds in order to protect the global creative economy,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n<p>Some users of Streamzz, meanwhile, have concerns about their own economies.<\/p>\n<h2>How it Started\u2026.<\/h2>\n<p>Streamzz (or simply Streamz) has been around since 2019, operating from several different domains. In a 2020 <a href=\"https:\/\/tarnkappe.info\/artikel\/interviews\/streamz-interview-mit-den-betreibern-des-streaming-hosters-58028.html\">interview<\/a> with Tarnkappe, one of the site\u2019s operators declined to comment on future successes leading to the sipping of cocktails on a tropical beach. \u201cWe just let ourselves be surprised,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>On March 14, three of the site\u2019s domains \u2013 streamz.vg, streamz.cc and streamz.tw \u2013 had their records updated to reveal their new owner: Motion Picture Association, Inc. Domains still to be taken over currently deliver a message: \u201cWe currently have server problems. Please understand.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><center><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamz-domains2.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamz-domains2.png\" alt=\"streamz-domains2\" width=\"610\" height=\"103\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-232467\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamz-domains2.png 1801w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/streamz-domains2-300x51.png 300w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/streamz-domains2-1536x260.png 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px\"><\/a><\/center><\/p>\n<p>Today\u2019s situation is a far cry from the optimism and business drive of Streamz back in 2020. In order to build a popular service, Streamz needed two things; people to upload movies and TV shows to Streamz, and people to watch them on third-party streaming sites where they would be embedded. <\/p>\n<h2>Building Up, Building Trust<\/h2>\n<p>The image below shows that people were incentivized to upload popular content and generate traffic for the platform. For a considerable time, everything seemed to go broadly as planned.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><center><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamz-launch.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamz-launch.png\" alt=\"streamz launch\" width=\"610\" height=\"411\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-232468\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamz-launch.png 725w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/streamz-launch-300x202.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px\"><\/a><\/center><\/p>\n<p>With uploaders getting paid to upload movies and TV shows to Streamz, and streaming sites placing links to that content in their own indexes, everyone in the mini-ecosystem had the ability to generate traffic and make money. <\/p>\n<p>To show that Streamz was indeed paying out earnings as promised, bonuses were paid to uploaders who posted screenshots of their payouts on a public forum. There appeared to be no shortage of people prepared to further compromise their security for a few extra dollars.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><center><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamzz-payout.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamzz-payout.png\" alt=\"streamzz payout\" width=\"610\" height=\"227\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-232469\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamzz-payout.png 789w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/streamzz-payout-300x111.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px\"><\/a><\/center><\/p>\n<p>Still, these public records of payouts tend to suggest that up until the first or second week of February, Streamzz may have been operating normally. <\/p>\n<h2>Mass Deletions Begin<\/h2>\n<p>When reports began to surface that Streamzz had begun mass deleting movies and TV shows, that was a sure sign of major underlying problems. A message on BS.to, a large Germany-focused streaming platform, reported that Streamzz was \u201chaving a massive deletion wave\u201d but the reasons for that were currently unknown.<\/p>\n<p>The manner in which those deletions became apparent to the site\u2019s uploaders and partners caused widespread confusion before spilling over into anger. It appears that when Streamzz deleted user-uploaded videos, they replaced them with random wildlife videos instead. <\/p>\n<p>Some uploaders got a little bit upset. Others operating in more specialist niches catering to more specific tastes, were absolutely furious.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><center><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamzz-zebra.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamzz-zebra.png\" alt=\"streamzz-zebra\" width=\"610\" height=\"599\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-232473\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/streamzz-zebra.png 860w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/streamzz-zebra-300x294.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 610px) 100vw, 610px\"><\/a><\/center><\/p>\n<p>While zebra videos might have pleased David Attenborough, <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/naomi_foxxo?lang=en\">Naomi Foxx<\/a> fans probably prefer videos that at least stay on topic. According to Streamzz, hardware issues were to blame.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are currently having a problem with the delivery of the videos as we are still waiting for a new raid controller. We will fix the problem as soon as possible and of course compensate for the downtime of the last days,\u201d a spokesperson explained. Some weren\u2019t convinced.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI find instead of my links I get videos about nature or clickbait videos for Telegram or Instagram. Almost all my links are gone with this shit, no support, no response,\u201d one user complained.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think it is appropriate not to utilize anymore, my site is not a Savannah Zoo, fuck.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>Animal Problems Disappear<\/h2>\n<p>As one observer wondered if the wildlife videos had appeared because Streamzz had servers \u201cfar from civilization,\u201d suddenly there were no more animal videos. Or anything else for that matter. <\/p>\n<p>Sometime late February, Streamzz ceased to exist beyond a handful of domains. As reported earlier, three of those domains are now controlled by the MPA and currently link to the ACE anti-piracy portal. <\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s possible that others will join them in the days to come.<\/p>\n<p>From: <a href=\"https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/\">TF<\/a>, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wpematico_credit\"><small>Powered by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wpematico.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">WPeMatico<\/a><\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As part of its relentless campaign to shut down as many pirate sites as possible, on Wednesday the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment reported yet another big win. The anti-piracy coalition\u2019s latest victim is Streamzz, a stream hosting platform that reportedly supplied over 75,000 movies and 15,000 TV episodes, which helped to fuel more than [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":72024,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[308],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72023","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-torrent"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72023","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=72023"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72023\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/72024"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=72023"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=72023"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=72023"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}