{"id":81499,"date":"2025-02-06T09:00:37","date_gmt":"2025-02-06T09:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/?p=81499"},"modified":"2025-02-06T09:00:37","modified_gmt":"2025-02-06T09:00:37","slug":"kickassanime-flagged-for-suspected-phishing-by-cloudflare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/?p=81499","title":{"rendered":"KickAssAnime Flagged for \u2018Suspected Phishing\u2019 by Cloudflare"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/kaa.jpg\" alt=\"kickassanime\" width=\"300\" height=\"145\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-263587\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/kaa.jpg 303w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/kaa-300x145.jpg 300w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/kaa-150x72.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\">With hundreds of millions of annual visits, KickAssAnime (KAA) is one of the larger anime pirate sites. <\/p>\n<p>The streaming portal, which relies on third-party hosted videos, is particularly popular in the United States. <\/p>\n<p>Over the years, rightsholders have attempted to pinpoint the site\u2019s operators, presumably to shut it down. Just last summer, the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) <a href=\"https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/ace-subpoenas-target-iptv-services-piracy-apps-and-streaming-portals-240616\/\">obtained a DMCA subpoena<\/a>, requiring Cloudflare to provide all information the company had on file.<\/p>\n<h2>Phishing Concerns<\/h2>\n<p>Whether this subpoena yielded any useful information is unknown. However, Cloudflare took action yesterday that significantly impacted KAA\u2019s operations. The company flagged all of the site\u2019s domains for \u2018suspected phishing,\u2019 displaying the following warning banner to visitors. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis website has been reported for potential phishing. Phishing is when a site attempts to steal sensitive information by falsely presenting as a safe source.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><center><em>Suspected Phishing<\/em><\/center><center><br \/><\/center><center><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/suspected-phish.jpg\" alt=\"sus phish\" width=\"600\" height=\"280\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-263595\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/suspected-phish.jpg 813w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/suspected-phish-300x140.jpg 300w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/suspected-phish-600x280.jpg 600w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/suspected-phish-150x70.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\"><\/center><\/p>\n<p>Cloudflare allows external parties to flag websites for phishing and other issues, but who was behind the report in this case remains unknown. KAA states that it has not received any further information from Cloudflare.<\/p>\n<p>Pirate sites have been linked to malware and phishing in the past, often due to malicious ads. A check on the main KickAssAnime domain <a href=\"https:\/\/www.virustotal.com\/gui\/domain\/kickassanime.mx\">on Virustotal<\/a> also lists some <a href=\"https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/virustot.jpg\">concerning<\/a> reports, but at Google Safe Browsing, there are <a href=\"https:\/\/transparencyreport.google.com\/safe-browsing\/search?url=kickassanime.mx&amp;hl=en\">no alarm bells<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>\u2018Mass Abuse Reports\u2019<\/h2>\n<p>According to KAA\u2019s operator, Dion, malicious ads are unlikely, as the site has reportedly been ad-free for some time. They are not aware of any potential phishing activities either.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe funny thing is, we don\u2019t request or ask for any personal information from our users, except for an email when they sign up. Also, the site has been ad-free for weeks,\u201d Dion says. <\/p>\n<p>KAA suspects that Cloudflare\u2019s action might be the result of a brute-force attack using mass abuse reports. The site has a potential offender in mind but, thus far, it has been unable to obtain additional information from Cloudflare. <\/p>\n<p>At the time of writing, the site\u2019s domains are still flagged for suspected phishing. In response, the operator has redirected them to an alternative domain name, KAA.mx. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><center><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/kaamx.jpg\" alt=\"kaa.mx\" width=\"600\" height=\"204\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-263611\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/kaamx.jpg 798w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/kaamx-300x102.jpg 300w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/kaamx-600x204.jpg 600w, https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/kaamx-150x51.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\"><\/center><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s difficult for outsiders to determine whether this action was based on false reports or if other factors were involved. Regardless of the reason for the flagging, and in addition to the clear copyright concerns, users should always exercise caution when visiting such sites.<\/p>\n<h2>More Cloudflare Action<\/h2>\n<p>On the topic of Cloudflare, it is worth noting that the company continues to receive requests to assist in identifying the operators of manga and anime websites for copyright enforcement purposes.<\/p>\n<p>As mentioned earlier, KAA have been in the crosshairs for a while. Earlier this week, Japanese publisher Shueisha requested a <a href=\"https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/subpoenaman.pdf\">subpoena<\/a> to identify the people behind manganato.com, chapmanganato.to, mkklcdnv6temp.com, chapmanganelo.com, manganelo.com, and mangakakalot.com.<\/p>\n<p>Whether that information \u2018fishing\u2019 expedition will yield any results has yet to be seen, but the <a href=\"https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/manga-publishers-maintain-pressure-despite-pirate-countermeasures-250125\/\">pressure is on<\/a>.<\/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>With hundreds of millions of annual visits, KickAssAnime (KAA) is one of the larger anime pirate sites. The streaming portal, which relies on third-party hosted videos, is particularly popular in the United States. Over the years, rightsholders have attempted to pinpoint the site\u2019s operators, presumably to shut it down. Just last summer, the Alliance for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":81500,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[308],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81499","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\/81499","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=81499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81499\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/81500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=81499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=81499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=81499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}