TorrentFreak

Since early February, Spain has faced unprecedented yet avoidable nationwide disruption to previously functioning, entirely legitimate online services.

A court order obtained by top-tier football league LaLiga in partnership with telecommunications giant Telefonica, authorized ISP-level blocking across all major ISPs to prevent public access to pirate IPTV services and websites.

In the first instance, controversy centered on Cloudflare, where shared IP addresses were blocked by local ISPs when pirates were detected using them, regardless of the legitimate Cloudflare customers using them too.

When legal action by Cloudflare failed, in part due to a judge’s insistence that no evidence of damage to third parties had been proven before the court, joint applicants LaLiga and Telefonica continued with their blocking campaign. It began affecting innocent third parties early February and hasn’t stopped since.

Vercel Latest Target

US-based Vercel describes itself as a “complete platform for the web.” Through the provision of cloud infrastructure and developer tools, users can deploy code from their computers and have it up and running in just seconds. Vercel is not a ‘rogue’ hosting provider that ignores copyright complaints, it takes its responsibilities very seriously.

Yet it became evident last week that blocking instructions executed by Telefonica-owned telecoms company Movistar were once again blocking innocent users, this time customers of Vercel.

Movistar informed of yet more adverse blocking

As the thread on X continued, Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch was asked whether Vercel had “received any requests to remove illegal content before the blocking occurs?”

Vercel Principal Engineer Matheus Fernandes answered quickly.

No takedown requests, just blocks

Additional users were soon airing their grievances; ChatGPT blocked regularly on Sundays, a whole day “ruined” due to unwarranted blocking of AI code editor Cursor, blocking at Cloudflare, GitHub, BunnyCDN, the list goes on.

Vercel Slams “Unaccountable Internet Censorship”

In a joint statement last week, Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch and Principal Engineer Matheus Fernandes cited the LaLiga/Telefonica court order and reported that ISPs are “blocking entire IP ranges, not specific domains or content.”

Among them, the IP addresses 66.33.60.129 and 76.76.21.142, “used by businesses like Spanish startup Tinybird, Hello Magazine, and others operating on Vercel, despite no affiliations with piracy in any form.”

This isn’t a narrowly scoped takedown. LaLiga is a private organization triggering IP-wide blocks that impact critical infrastructure, developers, and businesses—without review, due process, or transparency. These blocks are primarily enforced during LaLiga matchdays, typically on weekends and select weekdays, when live broadcasts occur.

ISP-level blocking of individual sites is common. Typically, this is done by inspecting the Server Name Indication (SNI) header during the TLS handshake. SNI contains the hostname in plaintext before encryption, allowing ISPs to block specific domains while leaving other traffic on the same IP untouched, even while the actual traffic is encrypted.

But that’s not what’s happening here. Spanish ISPs are blocking entire IPs, ignoring SNI and making no effort to distinguish between hosts. Any website or service behind a blocked IP is taken offline, regardless of its legitimacy.

What started as an anti-piracy measure has become an unaccountable form of internet censorship. There’s no distinction between targeted enforcement and mass collateral damage. IPs are being blocklisted wholesale.

Like all platforms working with user-uploaded content, Vercel receives external complaints concerning potential copyright infringement. Vercel’s latest transparency report reveals that during the latest reporting period it received 1,015 DMCA notices and restricted content in response to 1,001 of them. For additional perspective, Vercel has six million users and has a dedicated dispute resolution program, should that be necessary in respect of any complaint.

Vercel Now in Contact With LaLiga

The details concerning this latest blocking disaster and the many others since February, are unavailable to the public. This lack of transparency is consistent with most if not all dynamic blocking programs around the world. With close to zero transparency, there is no accountability when blocking takes a turn for the worse, and no obvious process through which innocent parties can be fairly heard. While these negatives are a real concern, it appears that tech-savvy Spaniards are embracing the challenge.

In our previous report we highlighted several coding projects that aim to counter the blocking issues in various ways. The hayahora.futbol project is especially impressive; it gathers evidence of blocking events, including dates, which ISPs implemented blocking, how long the blocks remained in place, and which legitimate services were wrongfully blocked.

Vercel blocked IP addresses, who was responsible, and for how long

While clearly unhappy with how the company has been treated, Vercel says it’s now working with LaLiga.

“We remain committed to providing fast, secure infrastructure for modern web applications. Likewise, we expect enforcement efforts to do the same: targeted, transparent, and technically sound. We are in contact with La Liga and are collaborating to remove illegal content in accordance with the court order. We’re exploring mitigation strategies to restore access for Spanish users and continue to advocate for an open and permissionless web,” Vercel concludes.

The Changing Role of ISPs

ISPs were traditionally the first to push back against site blocking but in Spain, all of those now involved have commercial interests in the content being blocked. They agreed to the terms of the blocking order, and they weren’t subjected to it against their will; that’s why the court approved it.

Yet when LaLiga is portrayed as the driving force behind events playing out in Spain, very little attention is paid to the significant help it needs to make blocking happen. The reasons why that help continues to arrive – despite known and repeated overblocking incidents – may raise questions as part of the wider net neutrality debate.

On one hand, LaLiga, Telefonica, and the interested ISPs, are protecting their rights in live LaLiga match broadcasts against rampant piracy under extremely difficult conditions. Yet on the other, they’re blocking IP addresses that their sophisticated anti-piracy departments know are also used by innocent companies and their customers trying to conduct legitimate business in Spain. There are suggestions that may yet run into trouble.

That leads us to RootedCON, the cybersecurity group that previously attempted to end LaLiga’s blocking campaign with an appeal to the court. Like Cloudflare, the bid failed but motivation to examine other potential opportunities remains high.

Previously dismissed as “geeks” by LaLiga, others consider the term “hackers” more descriptive. It also adds more spice to the recent mention that there may be a release of “technical tools to piss people off” as an interim (but entirely legal) anti-blocking measure.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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For major companies like Nintendo, tackling online piracy isn’t just about punishing individual infringers; it’s about strategic deterrence.

Filing lawsuits against casual gamers who may have made an isolated mistake is not a good look and could potentially backfire. Nintendo understands that and carefully picks its battles.

The case against Jesse Keighin, better known under his gaming handle “EveryGameGuru”, exemplifies this approach. Filed in a Colorado federal court last November, Nintendo’s complaint lists many alleged wrongdoings, including pre-release game streaming using pirated ROMs and distribution of circumvention tools.

Add in the public exposure through streaming platforms such as YouTube, Discord, and Twitch, and it’s not difficult to see why Nintendo singled out this defendant.

Absent and Undeterred Defendant

Facing a lawsuit from a multibillion-dollar company can be a frightening prospect. In this case, however, the defendant seemed undeterred, based on public messages that appeared online.

Instead of trying to avoid a legal disaster, Keighin apparently went on the offensive, with no sign of giving in. Quite the contrary.

“You might run a corporation. I run the streets,” Keighin wrote to Nintendo’s legal team at some point, warning that they should have done more research on him before taking action.

The defendant reportedly destroyed evidence and evaded Nintendo’s attempts to serve him personally. Due to these complications, the court eventually allowed service via email and the home addresses of his mother, grandmother, and partner.

When that didn’t yield a response in court either, the game giant requested an entry of default, so it could move the case forward without an official defense.

Nintendo Seeks Default Judgment

In a motion for default judgment, Nintendo explains that the defendant willfully streamed pirated copies of pre-release games to his followers. These streams were tagged as “EARLY RELEASE” or “FIRST LOOK,” but without authorization from Nintendo.

“At least fifty times in the last two years, Defendant streamed gameplay of pirated copies of at least ten different Nintendo games—all before those titles were released,” Nintendo writes.

“By streaming games prior to their publication, Defendant normalizes and encourages prerelease piracy, signaling to viewers that they too should pirate and play the game now, without waiting for its release or paying for it.”

Nintendo’s allegations

In addition to directly infringing the copyrights of games including “Mario & Luigi: Brothership”, the defendant also shared links to the Nintendo Switch emulators Ryujinx, Yuzu, Suyu, and Sudachi on social media. By doing so, Nintendo says he effectively trafficked in circumvention devices.

Nintendo also accuses Keighin of circumventing technical protection measures himself, in violation of the DMCA, as well as using hacked hardware to play pirated games.

“Defendant often used an emulator but also used a hacked Nintendo Switch, demonstrating that he decrypted and accessed without authorization the prerelease games he streamed,” Nintendo writes.

$17,500 and a Broad Injunction

The legal paperwork includes ten titles that the defendant allegedly infringed, willfully. In theory, this can lead to up to $1.5 million in statutory damages for copyright infringement alone, but the game company requests a substantially lower amount.

Here, Nintendo requests damages for only one of the ten games and says that $10,000 is an appropriate award. After ignoring previous warnings for close to two years, this should help deter future wrongdoings.

For circumvention of technological protection measures and trafficking in circumvention technology, the game giant requests damages of $5,000 and $2,500 respectively. This brings the total damages amount to $17,500.

In addition to the monetary damages, Nintendo also seeks a broad permanent injunction against Keighin, which would apply worldwide. If granted, this injunction will prohibit the defendant from any infringing activities going forward, including the use of emulators.

Nintendo’s proposed injunction (not granted yet)

These restrictions apply to existing emulators such as Yuzu or Ryujinx, but also those not yet named. Similarly, the injunction would apply to existing Nintendo games and games that do not yet exist. Meanwhile, all infringing hardware and software need to be destroyed.

The court has yet to grant Nintendo’s motion, but it’s notable that the company has not requested the maximum amount in compensation. Instead, it hopes to send a deterrent message to Keighin and other alleged pirates, to stop pirating and streaming Nintendo games.

Whether this strategy will pay off remains to be seen. Thus far, “EveryGameGuru” hasn’t been very receptive to Nintendo’s outreach. That said, this legal action also puts others on notice that Nintendo doesn’t appreciate pre-release streams or advertising of ‘rogue’ emulators.

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A copy of Nintendo’s motion for default judgment against Keighin, filed at the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado last Friday, is available here (pdf)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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Five years ago, the World Health Organization formally declared the COVID-19 outbreak as a pandemic.

Follow-up measures taken by governments and organizations around the world directly affected the lives of billions of people.

Those who were lucky enough to keep their jobs started to work from home, if possible. The same applied to school-going youth, who saw their social lives cut off due to lockdowns and curfews.

The devastating health crisis is over today, but its impact can’t be understated. Aside from lingering health issues, the aftermath also extends to the online piracy niche, where the effects of COVID-19 were already visible in anecdotal piracy figures early on.

In early 2020, we reported that there was increased interest in the movie Contagion, a decade-old classic which depicts a worldwide virus outbreak. Mid-March, the first signs revealed an increased interest in pirate sites and services in severely affected regions.

Soon after the pandemic was official, additional research revealed that torrent traffic spiked in many countries when lockdown measures were put in place.

Academic Paper Documents a Diverse Piracy Pandemic

While we take our own journalistic research seriously, it doesn’t compare to proper academic research. This typically takes years to complete and paints a more detailed and complex picture of COVID-19’s effects on piracy.

A paper titled “Digital piracy in times of Covid‑19” was published in the most recent issue of the Journal of Cultural Economics. Authored by Julia Mazzei and colleagues, it presents the results of an extensive survey conducted in 2022.

The full dataset includes 25,939 respondents, 7,095 of which are minors, from 14 different countries including France, Germany, United Kingdom, United States, Australia, Indonesia, and Brazil. All respondents were asked about their media consumption habits during the pandemic.

Paired with demographic information, including whether respondents experienced income reductions or significant changes to online working or schooling, the responses allowed the researchers to obtain more insight into the link between the pandemic, legal consumption, and piracy.

New Pirates Emerged

The overall conclusion shows that the number of new pirates grew faster than usual during the pandemic, while existing pirates increased their illegal consumption volumes.

“[A]s much as 6–8% of the population started using illegal channels during the pandemic, as opposed to a maximum of 2.5% that would be expected as a result of demographic developments. In addition, many who had used illegal channels before increased their pirating activities,” the researchers note.

The paper identifies two main drivers of this effect: affordability and available time. With more spare time, especially for those who were home-bound, people were eager for entertainment, including content offered through pirate sites and services.

The affordability aspect of piracy applies to everyone, but was particularly important for those who lost income as a result of the pandemic, as they may not have the funds to take out additional subscriptions.

Complex Effects on Legal Consumption

While it’s clear that piracy increased overall, this doesn’t mean that legal consumption decreased across the board. In fact, the opposite effect can be found.

For example, film and TV piracy showed a positive association with legal consumption. One illegally accessed movie or series was linked to an increase of 0.5 in legally consumed items, suggesting a potential sampling or complementary effect overall.

The music industry was less lucky, however, as the researchers found substantial negative displacement. Consuming one music album through illegal channels was associated with a 0.7 reduction in the amount of music accessed legally.

For books, there was no statistically significant link between piracy and legal consumption, measured over the entire population. For games, there was a small negative effect, but this was only marginally significant.

Zooming In Reveals More Detail

To add to the complexity, these displacement effects can differ according to age group. Looking at film and TV piracy, piracy among minors was linked to greater legal consumption, while the effect was reversed for young adults (18-34).

For books, the roles were reversed; piracy was linked to less legal consumption for minors, while young adults showed a positive association.

Interestingly, piracy displacement effects might also cross categories in some rare instances. For minors, film and TV piracy increased legal viewing activity, but it was also correlated with less book consumption. In other words, the increase in film and TV consumption, was linked to less book reading.

All in all, the study indicates that the pandemic clearly resulted in new pirates and more piracy. However, at the same time, it suggests that piracy is not by definition linked to fewer sales, or less legal activity.

The researchers end the paper by noting that people should be cautious in interpreting the findings as causal effects. Nonetheless, they help to shed further light on the complex piracy phenomenon, as it will be interesting to see if the findings will hold up in future studies.

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A copy of the paper, published under a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0) is available here. Mazzei, J., Martinelli, A., Nuvolari, A. et al. Digital piracy in times of Covid-19. J Cult Econ (2025)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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When the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment launched in 2017, the globalization of online piracy had been apparent for some time.

In the relatively calm waters of a decade earlier, the Hollywood majors tackled pirate adversaries all around the world, often while pooling resources under the banner of the MPAA.

Less-connected rightsholders had little choice but to go it alone while shouldering 100% of the costs. For those who meet the ACE entry criteria today, access to a wealth of knowledge and vast experience that money simply can’t buy, comes as part of the package after paying the ACE members’ annual fee.

Today over 50 companies involved in movie and TV production, broadcasting and distribution, and more recently live sports, come together as members of ACE, a collective inseparable from the anti-piracy operations of the MPA.

In day to day business, several member companies are direct rivals in the same markets, many more find themselves among general competition to varying degrees. Yet all have something in common; a persistent piracy problem that in many key markets, only seems to be getting worse.

Fighting Back Globally

The need to eliminate existing priority targets and swiftly suppress emerging priority threats is universally understood. Somewhere in the middle, where the bulk of pirate sites and services exist, sits a vast pool of potential targets ready for triage.

Relatively few are named in a full-blown lawsuit, but it does happen and can prove very costly indeed. Only very rarely does ACE confirm a shutdown in connection with a settlement agreement but again, that definitely happens too. The precise financial implications for site operators is almost never revealed but a six figure demand seen by TF some years ago seems unlikely to have been unique.

Domain Seizures For Q1 2025

Regardless of any financial terms they may or may not contain, a settlement or agreement to cease-and-desist often sees ACE/MPA take control of domain names, to prevent their infringing use moving forward.

The details occasionally appear in ACE announcements but more often than not, domains are silently signed over to the MPA, with future visitors redirected to the ACE portal for a warning on the dangers of piracy. Pick an especially rare domain and the redirect may even lead to the MPA’s site.

Pirates can pick their poison (ACE left, MPA right)

The only mention of domain seizures thus far in 2025 appears in an announcement revealing the closure of Spanish file-hosting site Gamovideo. The pair of domains seized aren’t identified by name but we can confirm they are gamovideo.com and gamovideo.net.

Domains seized during the first quarter of 2025 (plus a few seized earlier this month), appear in the table below. There’s around 80 in total, but a few more may already be in the pipeline.

ACE/MPA – Pirate Domains Seized 2025 (Q1)**

The seized domains reveal a familiar mix of movie and TV show streaming sites, live sports streaming sites, plus a small number of file-hosting and IPTV services. Nothing especially unusual, at least as far as we’re able to determine.

Some of these sites may reappear in the weeks or months ahead under existing or new branding. Others may happily throw in the towel and consider themselves lucky. Much seems to depend on the location of site operators and/or the level to which ACE has managed to strip away their anonymity.

Such matters are never discussed publicly but circumstantial evidence suggesting a lack of respect for agreements among a minority isn’t too difficult to find. Nor is it likely to be forgotten – ever.

MPA Has an Impressive Domain Collection

Finally, if success could be measured based on the volume of domain seizures alone, no other anti-piracy group in the world would come close to the haul amassed by ACE/MPA.

For the sole purpose of demonstrating the scale, the table below contains roughly 500 domains. Not all domains are instantly identifiable, so there’s a chance that a small number of non-pirate domains may have slipped through the net.

If that’s the case, refilling the gaps with pirate replacements won’t be an issue. The API used to obtain this list returned around 1,300 domains in response to a reverse WHOIS query for ‘Motion Picture Association, Inc.‘ of which we discarded around 200 for being general use domains not directly connected to piracy. Another API suggests the availability of considerably more; around 11,000, give or take.

Many domains need to be renewed at the end of year one, so the cost of holding them all long-term is likely to be significant.

Not for the MPA, of course, especially when compared to the billions of untapped business said to flood away each year due to the very thing the members of ACE are determined to reduce.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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With millions of daily users, Reddit is undoubtedly one of the most visited sites on the Internet.

The community-oriented platform has “subreddits” dedicated to pretty much every topic one can think of, including several that are linked to online piracy and related issues.

As the platform continued to grow into the $17 billion company that it is today, rightsholders started to pay attention to these discussions. Eight years ago, Reddit was asked to remove ‘just’ 4,352 pieces of content, but that increased to well over a million a few years later.

Reddit Publishes Transparency Report

This week, Reddit published its latest transparency report which shows that this year-long upward trend has reversed recently. The company now receives fewer and fewer takedown requests.

The takedown surge peaked in 2023 with rightsholders asking the platform to remove more than 1.7 million pieces of content. The latest figures indicate that this number declined by roughly 50% last year to 879,645.

This is a significant drop by itself. However, it’s even more pronounced if we look at the number of requests Reddit took action on. This decreased to 550,554 items last year, compared to 1.2 million removals a year earlier.

The lower actionability rate is mostly driven by the second half of last year, where less than half of all items flagged by rightsholders were removed. This is mostly caused by duplicate reports.

The chart below(*) shows that Reddit also declined to take action in response to tens of thousands of reports because it didn’t find any infringement. Meanwhile, 5,573 reports failed to identify specific content and 1,721 items were suspected to be fraudulently reported.

Fair ‘AI’ Use

Reddit also declined to remove content because it deemed these to be “fair use”. The absolute number for these is very low, 360 items in the final half of last year, but the reasons provided are all the more intriguing.

For example, Reddit declined to take action in response to a notice from a major sports rightsholder because the identified clip wasn’t a full broadcast, but an AI-generated parody.

“The rightsholder for a major televised sporting event submitted a copyright takedown notice seeking the removal of a video from Reddit, and identified their copyrighted work as a full broadcast,” Reddit notes.

“The video posted to Reddit used AI to significantly transform and parody a short clip taken from the original broadcast. We declined to remove this content because we believe it makes fair use of the broadcast.”

The example provided by Reddit is unique and rare, but it indicates that the company pays attention to individual notices, including potential defenses against copyright infringement claims.

Repeat Infringers

Moving on, Reddit reports that in the second half of 2024, it banned 1,813 users for repeat copyright infringements. In addition, 181 subreddits were banned permanently for the same reason.

The number of user bans is significantly higher than the first half of the year, and for the subreddits this effect is reversed.

Looking further back, these copyright-related bans are down significantly from their 2022 peak, similar to the removals. Reddit previously banned 5,853 users in 2022, while 3,215 subreddits were taken offline that year.

It will be interesting to see if these copyright action downtrends continue in the years to come. That is certainly not a given, as is exemplified by Google’s recent copyright takedown resurgence.

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Note: (*) This breakdown doesn’t appear to include all reported items from noticed that were classified as invalid. We report them as they appeared in the report.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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Anna’s Archive is a meta-search engine for shadow libraries that allows users to find pirated books and other related resources.

In late 2023, the search engine Anna’s Archive expanded its offering by making data from OCLC’s proprietary WorldCat database available online.

Anna’s Archive scraped several terabytes of data over the course of a year and published roughly 700 million unique records online, for free.

These records contain no copyrighted books or articles. However, they can help to create a to-do list of all missing shadow library content on the web, with the ultimate goal of making as much content publicly available as possible.

OCLC Sued Anna’s Archive

This ‘metadata’ heist was a massive breakthrough in the quest to archive as much published content as possible online. However, OCLC responded with a lawsuit filed at an Ohio federal court, accusing the site and its operators of hacking and demanding damages.

The non-profit says that it spent more than a million dollars responding to Anna’s Archive’s alleged hacking efforts. Even then, it couldn’t prevent the data from being released through a torrent.

Following the alleged hacking efforts, OCLC attempted to identify the perpetrators. The investigation led them to Seattle resident Maria Dolores A. Matienzo, the sole named defendant in the case.

The complaint mentioned that Matienzo describes herself as an “archivist” and uses the handle “anarchivist” on social media and Github. The defendant was allegedly employed as a software engineer at an AI startup and previously worked as a catalog librarian at a direct competitor of OCLC.

Maria A. Denies Involvement

Responding to the allegations in court, Matienzo denied any involvement with Anna’s Archive.

“I am not affiliated in any way with Anna’s Archive and had no involvement in the alleged hacking and/or scraping of data from WorldCat.org that was allegedly orchestrated and carried out by Anna’s Archive,” Matienzo wrote.

In a motion to dismiss, Matienzo’s attorney wrote that there is no “shred of evidence” that links the defendant to the search engine, let alone any of the alleged hacking or scraping efforts.

As the case progressed, no other defendants were identified. OCLC moved for a default judgment against the ‘unnamed’ operators, while Matienzo’s motion to dismiss was pending. Last month, however, an Ohio federal judge slammed on the brakes.

In a detailed order, Judge Watson expressed uncertainty about the legality of large-scale data scraping under state law.

Citing this uncertainty, the judge denied OCLC’s request for default judgment against Anna’s Archive and denied Matienzo’s motion to dismiss without prejudice, pending clarification from the Supreme Court of Ohio, to which several core legal questions were referred.

Key Defendant Dropped From Lawsuit

Disappointed by the decision, OCLC asked the court to reconsider its position. It also requested the only named defendant to be dropped from the case, to focus on obtaining a final judgment against Anna’s Archive, which could help to get the associated domain names blocked.

The Ohio federal court initially denied the request over procedural issues, after which OCLC and Matienzo filed a joint motion this week, asking the court to drop the defendant from the case.

“At this juncture of the proceedings, OCLC and Matienzo have reached an agreement that Matienzo be dropped from this action. As a result, OCLC no longer seeks relief from Matienzo in this action,” the joint motion reads.

This request has yet to be approved by the court but with agreement from both sides, that’s likely just a formality. And because the defendant will be dropped ‘with prejudice’, similar claims can’t be refiled against her at a later stage.

From the public filings, it appears that OCLC has no idea who the real operators of Anna’s Archive are. There sure are plenty of archivists named Anna, but ideally, they need something more than association by name.

Instant update: The motion to dismiss Matienzo from the case was granted.

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A copy of the joint motion to drop defendant Maria Matienzo from the lawsuit, filed on Tuesday, is available here (pdf)

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A trio of DMCA subpoena applications filed in the United States this week aim to extract any information held by three well-known internet companies, on potentially dozens of pirate site operators using their services.

The vast majority of the requests appear in a single DMCA subpoena targeting Cloudflare. Of the 52 main domains in that application, six also appear in another application directed at Tonic Corporation’s .to registry.

While .to domains are preferred by some operators due to the limited information requested by the registry when acquiring them, ACE/MPA file requests similar to the one below several times each year.

Six Domains Face Double Scrutiny

The final subpoena contains a single request for Zenlayer to offer up the personal details of whoever is behind the app MAGIS TV v7.1.2, which appears to serve movies direct from the company’s servers.

Stability vs. Mobility

In the DMCA subpoena above targeting Tonic, 1337x.to is easily recognized as the main domain of one of the most popular torrent sites online today, having been in use for well over a decade. The domain predates the launch of Google’s transparency report a decade ago, but since then has been targeted by at least 6.59 million URL takedown notices sent to Google alone.

For comparison, other domains mentioned in the subpoenas, including netmovies.to (2022) and 1hd.to (2023), have attracted relatively few takedown notices. Further examples, including Binged.to and Freek.to, only raised their heads above the parapet in the last quarter of 2024, and have barely received any at all.

Freek.to

That leaves freeky.to which appears to have attracted just four takedown notices – ever. As the data in the table below shows, traffic growth at some of these sites has been remarkable in the absence of significant pushback.

The data above begins in January but for Freek.to, December 2024 was an even more productive month; over 24 million visits according to SimilarWeb data, with less than 5% of its overall traffic attributed to organic search.

Time to Burn

With ACE/MPA now clearly on the case, future tactics should be interesting to watch. That being said, ACE has seen this same pattern of activity several times before. Sooner or later, the domains above will likely cease to exist, or at least, won’t present the problems they once did after their return to storage.

At that point, all eyes will be on the new rising stars of pirate streaming, having apparently appeared out of thin air but just in time to seamlessly scoop up a massive windfall of traffic.

The Rest of the Rest

Other domains listed in the DMCA subpoena include hydrahd.me, a domain that received 87.1m visits in January, 82.1m in February, and ‘just’ 54.7m in March. The domain hydrahd.cc also ‘lost’ significant traffic, falling from 2.57m in January to less than 1 million in March. Hydrahd.com started the year with 500K visits but by March had just 125K left.

Fortunately, hydrahd.ac performed significantly better; zero visits in January and February led to a healthy 21.3m in March. The reasons for the site returning an intermittent Error 451 (Unavailable for Legal Reasons) this week are currently unknown.

The rest of the domains can be found with additional data in the table below. How many will choose to self-destruct and/or hand themselves in for seamless recycling will probably become apparent in due course, at least among those with the strength, patience, and spare time to keep up.

Copies of the DMCA subpoena applications are available here (1,2,3,pdf)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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Without assurances that hosts, domain registries, registrars, DNS providers, and consumer ISPs would not be immediately held liable for internet users’ activities, investing in the growth of the early internet may have proven less attractive.

Of course, not being held immediately liable is a far cry from not being held liable at all. After years of relatively plain sailing, multiple ISPs in the United States are currently embroiled in multi-multi million dollar lawsuits for not policing infringing users. In Europe, countries including Italy and France have introduced legislation to ensure that if online services facilitate or assist piracy in any way, they can be compelled by law to help tackle it.

DNS Under Pressure

Given their critical role online, and the fact that not a single byte of infringing content has ever touched their services, some believed that DNS providers would be among the last services to be put under pressure.

After Sony sued Quad9 and wider discussions opened up soon after, in 2023 Canal+ used French law to target DNS providers. Last year, Google, Cloudflare, and Cisco were ordered to prevent their services from translating domain names into IP addresses used by dozens of sports piracy sites.

While all three companies objected, it’s understood that Cloudflare and Google eventually complied with the order. Cisco’s compliance was also achieved, albeit by its unexpected decision to suspend access to its DNS service for the whole of France and the overseas territories listed in the order.

So Long France, Goodbye Belgium

Another court order obtained by DAZN at the end of March followed a similar pattern.

Handed down by a court in Belgium, it compels the same three DNS providers to cease returning IP addresses when internet users provide the domain names of around 100 pirate sports streaming sites.

At last count those sites were linked to over 130 domain names which in its role as a search engine operator, Google was also ordered to deindex from search results.

During the evening of April 5, Belgian media reported that a major blocking campaign was underway to protect content licensed by DAZN and 12th Player, most likely football matches from Belgium’s Pro League. DAZN described the action as the “the first of its kind” and a “real step forward” in the fight against content piracy. Google and Cloudflare’s participation was not confirmed, but it seems likely that Cisco was not involved all.

In a very short statement posted to the Cisco community forum, employee tom1 announced that effective April 11, 2025, OpenDNS will no longer be accessible to users in Belgium due to a court order. The nature of the order isn’t clarified, but it almost certainly refers to the order obtained by DAZN.

Cisco’s suspension of OpenDNS in Belgium mirrors its response to a similar court order in France. Both statements were delivered without fanfare which may suggest that the company prefers not to be seen as taking a stand. In reality, Cisco’s reasons are currently unknown and that has provoked some interesting comments from users on the Cisco community forum.

Possible Motivation to Exit

Whether the rightsholders requested it, or the Judge simply thought it was appropriate, is still unclear, but the blocking order has a sting in its tail for non-compliance. Believed to be targeted at Cloudflare, Google, and Cisco – but not Belgian ISPs also required to comply with its terms – the order warns of penalties of €100,000 for each day of non-compliance. A user on Cisco’s forum felt that compliance shouldn’t be a problem.

“The court is very specific what needs to be blocked (130 pirate sports streaming domains and five illegal IPTV platforms). Blocking DNS requests based on domain categorization is at the core of the service of OpenDNS. There is nothing stating that OpenDNS should stop its services in Belgium,” Wiggum wrote.

“So why isn’t OpenDNS complying to this ruling? Instead, by pulling out of [Belgium], the Internet becomes less safe for those making use of it.”

While these are valid points, without the order being made available to the public, the definition of “non-compliance” is an unknown factor with potential to tip the scales. €100,000 per day is an awful lot of money for failing to deal with alleged copyright infringement over which the company has zero visibility.

Compliance is an Ongoing Commitment

The second and most critical factor is the assumption that blocking 130 domains is the end of Cisco’s obligations. The blocking order is dynamic, meaning that DAZN can and will add additional domains to the block list whenever that’s required. On the basis that blocking new domains quickly is the main goal of dynamic blocking, it’s at least possible that Cisco preferred an exit rather than a ruinous penalty hanging over its head.

Speculation, of course, but with no such penalties directed at the pirate sites themselves, it’s not difficult to see why being held liable may not sit well with intermediaries distant from any potential infringement.

For those who until recently were simply going about their daily business, blindly directing overwhelmingly legal internet traffic, perhaps the mandatory police uniform didn’t fit or sit well.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

From TorrentFreak via this RSS feed

With an estimated 240 million visits during the first three months of the year, Nhentai is one of the most trafficked websites online today.

The site serves adult-oriented anime and manga, also known as hentai. These spicy Japanese comics are popular worldwide but not everyone is happy with Nhentai or its massive audience. Some rightsholders consider the site a deviant pirate operation.

California-based rightsholder PCR Distributing, which operates under brands including J18 and JAST USA, initiated action against nHentai last summer, describing the site as a significant threat to its business.

PCR initially requested a DMCA subpoena asking Cloudflare to unmask the people behind the site, claiming that they failed to process takedown notices. These subpoena requests are typically straightforward, but not in this case, as Nhentai decided to intervene in court.

Nhentai Sued by Publisher for Widespread Piracy

Facing opposition, PCR swiftly dropped the subpoena request and filed a full complaint against the site’s operators in a California federal court instead. According to the publisher, Nhentai shares copyrighted material without obtaining permission.

“[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 alleged.

Nhentai’s initial opposition, in which it countered that it had been granted permission to share content, already indicated that the site had no plans to leave these allegations uncontested. And indeed, Nhentai responded to the lawsuit and actively fought back.

Nhentai Seeks Dismissal and Anonymity

In January, Nhentai asked the court to dismiss the lawsuit in its entirety. The anonymous operators said there were several grounds for the court to end the lawsuit prematurely, including insufficient copyright registrations.

In addition, Nhentai requested a protective order to proceed in the case anonymously, at least in the early stages. Keeping personal details out of public filings, but available to the opposing attorneys, would shield them from potential retribution.

“The specific harm and prejudice to Nhentai.net is that the Plaintiff in this matter has shown particular animus toward Nhentai.net and even its counsel and taken public action accordingly,” Nhentai’s attorney wrote.

“In truth, this case has nothing to do with copyright infringement, but rather appears to be a money grab and an attempt to take over the entire domain www.nhentai.net based on knowingly meritless claims,” the defense added.

Nhentai Operators Ordered to Unveil Themselves

Nhentai’s operators asked the court to keep their personal details private, at least until the motion to dismiss had been decided. In February, however, U.S. Magistrate Judge Joel Richlin decided otherwise.

The defendants failed to provide sufficient evidence that they would be harmed by being named, the Magistrate Judge concluded. The order further noted that there’s a public interest in knowing who the operators of this popular site are.

“The focus of this case is a publicly available website alleged to receive around 79.38 million monthly visitors from the United States and around the world. Thus, the Court easily concludes that the public has a strong interest in knowing the identity of the corporate entity that operates this website and is appearing in federal court,” Judge Richlin wrote.

Nhentai objected to the ruling, but after the matter was referred to California District Court Judge Cynthia Valenzuela, the Judge arrived at the same conclusion.

“Overall, Defendant has made no showing that it is entitled to keep its identity hidden from the parties to the action, this Court, or the public, let alone a showing that the Magistrate Judge Order was clearly erroneous or contrary to law,” Judge Valenzuela wrote in her decision last week.

Dismissal Denied, Case Continues

In addition to denying the protective order, Judge Valenzuela also denied Nhentai’s motion to dismiss the copyright infringement claims.

Judge Valenzuela notes that PCR sufficiently pled that it owns valid copyrights that are being infringed by the defendant. While there may be potential shortcomings in the pleading, they don’t warrant a dismissal at this stage.

This means that the case will now move forward with all copyright infringement claims intact.

Jason Tucker, president of anti-piracy outfit Battleship Stance, which helps PCR and other companies with their legal strategies, is pleased with the outcome. He says it confirms that the defendants in these cases can’t remain anonymous.

“These rulings send a clear message: you don’t get to profit from other people’s work and stay hidden in the process. I’m glad the Court recognized that this case is about holding people accountable when they build businesses off someone else’s content.”

“That’s one of the few ways we can protect creative work and the people who make it. We’re still in the early stages, but it’s a meaningful step forward,” Tucker adds.

Both the motion to dismiss and the motion for a protective order were decided on the April 8th. The court ordered Nhentai to file a status report, disclosing the names of all defendants within three business days. A week has now passed, and as of today, no defendants appear to have been publicly named in court filings.

—

A copy of Judge Cynthia Valenzuela’s order denying the motion to dismiss and the motion to strike is available here (pdf). The order denying the motion for a protective order can be found here (pdf)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

From TorrentFreak via this RSS feed

As debate heats up in the United States over proposed site-blocking legislation, opinions of what that might mean in practice are already beginning to emerge.

Introduced by Rep. Zoe Lofgren late January, the Foreign Anti-Digital Piracy Act (FADPA) attempts to distill well over a decade of site blocking experience amassed by U.S. rightsholders overseas, into a package carefully curated for use on home soil.

Site-Blocking Debate Returns to Polarization

Should it become law, FAPDA would allow rightsholders to obtain site blocking orders targeted at verified pirate sites, run by foreign or assumed foreign operators. The proposals as they stand today envision blocking orders that would apply to both ISPs and DNS resolvers, the latter an already controversial trend that has only recently shown momentum in Europe.

As proponents have made clear many times over the past 15 years or so, to remain effective site-blocking must continuously adapt. That necessarily means that the FADPA proposals on the table today are the starting point for U.S. site-blocking. For those advocating in favor of FADPA, especially as a highly predictable framework with guardrails for safety, the inherent need to adapt and expand presents challenges for longer-term assurances.

No Wild Predictions Required, Europe Holds the Answers

Unlike the SOPA debate in 2012, where wild predictions one way or another had no clear historical basis, today there is a deep well of information to draw from, much of it the result of U.S. rightsholders’ implementation of site-blocking in Europe. As such, events there should be considered informative.

Established four years ago, Germany operates an administrative site blocking regime which requires no direct legal oversight. A partnership between rightsholders and local ISPs saw the launch of the “Clearing Body for Copyright on the Internet” (CUII) which is now responsible for handing down blocking instructions against sites that structurally infringe copyright.

Recommendations for blocking are published on the CUII website, along with redacted reports explaining investigators’ findings. The image below shows all recommendations for blocking since the program began.

This level of transparency is already a step up from broadly equivalent schemes seen elsewhere in Europe. However, in common with many of its counterparts elsewhere, the domains subsequently nominated by rightsholders and then blocked by ISPs are on a confidential list to which the public has no access. Or at least, that was the original plan.

Confidential Block List Exposed By ISP

A Netzpolitik report published last week revealed that Germany’s secret site-blocking list had been publicly available for at least 10 months via the URL rpz01do.versatel-west.de. Accidentally made available by ISP 1&1 Versatel, the URL let visitors see every domain blocked by local ISPs, enabling them to see how the list changed over time following numerous updates.

While the CUII website lists 24 platforms for blocking, at last count the exposed list contained well over ten times more domains/subdomains, over 300 in total. For perspective, Germany’s site-blocking program is very modest when compared to schemes in the UK, France, Italy, and Spain, for example, where thousands of sites are blocked with information on domains mostly restricted.

Last year we reported on the work of Damian, a then-17-year-old in Germany who lifted the veil of secrecy on the scale of domain blocking via the site cuiiliste.de.

“CUII is a private organization that blocks websites that it believes violate copyright law – without any court orders. In addition, their approach seems very non-transparent in my opinion,” Damian said.

Damian and others working on the project used various DNS-based techniques to establish which domains were blocked in Germany. However, he informs Netzpolitik that access to the ‘leaked’ master list helped to confirm that all blocked domains were present on the cuiliste.de site, something that can longer be guaranteed.

That’s because, predictably, as soon as 1&1 Versatel discovered its accidental transparency, measures were swiftly taken to ensure the list was hidden away as originally intended.

Site-Blocking = Censorship?

A pro-FADPA article published late last week by the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation put forward reasons ‘Why the US Should Block Piracy’. One of a series of articles with a similar theme over the last few years, the piece describes site-blocking as “a no-brainer” and U.S. policy as having “international precedent.”

The crux of the piece dismisses concerns that FADPA could be used as a tool for censorship, and rejects the notion that the “one sided process” through which orders are obtained are “fundamentally flawed.” These are entrenched positions that have closed very little over the last 12+ years and will undoubtedly continue to rage as the months unfold.

“[W]hen policymakers propose reasonable, legally sound tools to stop [piracy], critics respond with hyperbole, misdirection, and scare tactics,” the piece adds, a claim that has been utilized by both sides, if any at all.

No Censorship Where There’s Transparency

Claims of censorship often depend on the context and the FADPA proposals in the U.S. will need to address those claims at some point, whether justified or not. However, while censorship and transparency have some similarities, the latter may deserve more attention.

Proposals in the U.S. suggest a system not dissimilar to those operating in Europe, with and without involvement of the courts. An initial blocking order against a platform will be made available to the public, but since those orders are likely to be flexible (‘dynamic’ in site-blocking parlance), permission will be granted to block additional resources without returning to court.

Following the clear pattern on display in Europe, whatever rightsholders and ISPs agree to block privately, will be blocked, and if there is no transparency requirement, none will be forthcoming.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

From TorrentFreak via this RSS feed

Tech companies are racing to build the most powerful Artificial Intelligence (AI) but how these systems are trained is now mired in controversy.

Many major tech firms allegedly used huge amounts of copyrighted material to train their AI, without obtaining permission from rightsholders. This has triggered a series of copyright infringement lawsuits.

Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, is one of the companies being sued. Well-known book authors, including Richard Kadrey, Sarah Silverman, and Christopher Golden, previously filed a class-action lawsuit against the company.

This lawsuit has a clear piracy angle, as Meta used BitTorrent to download archives of pirated books to use as training material for its Llama models.

Notably, the authors argued that, in addition to downloading pirated books from Anna’s Archive, Z-Library and other sources, Meta uploaded pirated books to third parties in the process.

Last month, both parties filed motions for summary judgment. Meta’s motion relied heavily on a fair use defense. Meanwhile, the authors argued that the downloading of millions of books cannot be classified as fair use, since the source of the books is clearly copyright-infringing.

Law Professors Back Both Sides

Given the high stakes, the motions for summary judgment attracted interest from various third parties. Through amicus brief filings, these groups are asking the court to consider their perspectives. Previously, several law professors backed Meta, for example, arguing that training AI using ‘pirated’ content might be fair use.

Not all law professors agree with this conclusion, however, as highlighted in a new amicus brief from another group of law professors. This “friend of the court” brief, submitted last Friday, clearly backs the authors.

These law professors, who don’t address the BitTorrent-specific allegations, believe that using copyrighted books to train AI is not fair use.

“Meta’s claim that its unauthorized copying of plaintiffs’ works to train its large language models is fair use is a breathtaking request for greater legal privileges than courts have ever granted human authors. It should be rejected,” they write.

Using copyrighted works without permission might be considered ‘fair use’ if the use creates a new and transformative product. However, the law professors don’t believe that’s the case here.

Instead, they see the AI end product as a commercial tool that has a similar purpose to the books it is trained on; namely, to educate people.

“The use of copyrighted works to train generative models is not ‘transformative,’ because using works for that purpose is not relevantly different from using them to educate human authors, which is a principal original purpose of all of plaintiffs’ works,” the professors state.

“That training use is also not ‘transformative’ because its purpose is to enable the creation of works that compete with the copied works in the same markets – a purpose that, when pursued by a for-profit company like Meta, also makes the use undeniably ‘commercial’.”

In their 19-page brief, the professors dispute Meta’s fair use defense by analyzing several relevant factors. They ultimately conclude that these factors weigh “conclusively” against a finding of fair use.

Professors’ conclusion

Publishers Highlight Brazen Widespread Piracy

The book authors also receive support from other third parties, including The International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers (STM), which also submitted an amicus curiae brief last Friday.

The publishers’ brief highlights the shadow libraries that Meta allegedly used to source some of its training materials. These include Z-Library, Sci-Hub, Library Genesis and Anna’s Archive, which have all been subject to legal problems of their own; such as the criminal prosecution of two alleged Z-Library operators.

“The illegal websites that Meta used to purloin a trove of copyrighted works have been the repeated subject of enforcement,” the publishers’ brief reads.

“Collectively, they have been found by multiple courts to be illegal and against the public interest; investigated by the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice, including for potential espionage; had their domains shut down; and had their operators arrested.”

From the STM brief

Meta previously argued that its alleged use of copyrighted books as training inputs could be seen as fair use, regardless of the source of the data. However, STM sees this differently. They say that the “use of stolen content matters.”

The brief urges the court to consider these pirate sources, not only regarding the direct copyright infringement claim, but also when determining fair use for the AI training.

“Meta knowingly copied and distributed a shocking amount of infringing material from the world’s most notorious infringing websites to serve its commercial ends. Meta’s brazen acts of infringement, unprecedented in the annals of copyright law, must be considered in the context of fair use and should weigh heavily against it,” the publishers conclude.

The publishers’ position doesn’t come as a surprise, as they are directly impacted by the legal debate over AI training data. However, the fact that law professors can have vastly different opinions on the fair use analysis, shows that this isn’t an easy matter to resolve in court.

And given the stakes at play, these and other AI-related fair-use questions could very well end up at the Supreme Court in a few years.

—

Update: The Association of American Publishers (AAP) has also submitted an amicus brief (pdf).

“In filing this amicus brief, AAP explains in detail that Meta’s systematic copying and encoding of protected creative works, word by word, into a large language model, is not a transformative fair use under the law, but rather, grossly exceeds the doctrine’s legal purpose and judicial precedent,” says Maria A. Pallante, AAP’s President and CEO.

“The brief also corrects Meta’s spurious assertion that there is no way for AI developers to lawfully license what they seek to use, citing numerous examples to the contrary of existing and emerging markets.”

—

A copy of the Amicus Curiae brief from the Law Professors is available here (pdf), and the brief from the International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers can be found here (pdf)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

From TorrentFreak via this RSS feed

In the wake of a global pandemic, an ongoing war in Europe, and a new U.S. president taking the world on a surprise mystery tour to somewhere, Season 7 of Black Mirror faces the show’s toughest test following its Netflix debut on Thursday.

Ensuring each episode has a provocative, meaningful impact is getting harder in a world where the highly improbable seems to happen much more frequently. Facing genuine competition from real world events, including some that don’t involve Greenland, desensitization is likely to be a factor already.

Block Mirror?

There’s a risk that a Spanish-themed episode, in which a powerful corporation blocks internet traffic to improve sales of an exclusive entertainment product, might be too much, too soon.

Starting around 2008 before reaching its climax in a dystopian future labeled 2025, it could reveal how ISP blocking measures that the public didn’t want, were presented as the only viable option for tackling pirate sites. The episode could place emphasis on assurances that site blocking would always respect fundamental rights, such as the right to receive and impart information.

After fast forwarding to the present day, the episode could show how site blocking has matured to the point where targeting hundreds of pirate sites, means blocking thousands of innocent sites at the same time. Delivered to camera with a completely straight face, the audience should be informed that blocking innocent websites is perfectly fine, because a judge says that it’s legal.

Given that websites in Spain contain material protected by copyright, not to mention information that EU citizens have a right to impart and receive, it does seem unfair that thousands of sites (some claim its millions) find themselves completely blacked out when football matches are broadcast in Spain.

Circumvent Site-Blocking

So, with no help from the authorities and no TV deal expected anytime soon, Spaniards are beginning to take matters into their own hands.

Pirates have always circumvented blocking measures, mostly to access pirated content that blocking measures are supposed to deny. Today, regular developers are coming up with solutions to thwart site blocking, for reasons that include running a business and feeding their families. All they want, and it’s really not much at all, is to put up a website and have people who’d like to pay a visit face no barriers while doing so.

Well, help is starting to arrive, at least unofficially. The developers of the tools below hope to improve a situation that has only deteriorated in recent weeks.

The tools listed below are available from GitHub. Usual security caveats apply, if in any doubt, do not install.

Cloudflare Status Monitor for LaLiga Blocks

GitHub repo: aitorroma/cloudflare-laliga-bypass

Summary of key features/benefits • The script monitors check.aitorroma.com to verify if Cloudflare is active. • When LaLiga implements blocks during football matches, the system automatically detects it. • Automatically disables Cloudflare when blocks are detected • Reactivates Cloudflare when the site is back online • Uses webhooks to keep you informed about status changes

• Minimize downtime during football broadcasts • Eliminates the need to manually manage Cloudflare blocks • Provides an automated solution to keep the service available • Ensures service continuity for legitimate websites

Cloudflare Status Monitor for LaLiga Blocks is available on GitHub

LaLiga Block Evasion Filter

GitHub repo: fdezsergio02/Anti-LaLiga

How does the filter work?

This filter leverages the benefits of major CDN servers, allowing you to replace the blocked IP address provided by the DNS server with an IP address from the affected CDN that is not blocked, allowing websites to load correctly.

For example, if the URL “example.com” is associated with the IP address “1.2.3.4,” which is blocked by carriers, this filter switches to an unblocked IP address, such as “1.2.3.5,” so that legitimate pages can load correctly. Depending on the situation, it rotates to the next IP address or chooses a different IP address belonging to the same CDN.

LaLiga Block Evasion Filter is available on GitHub

LaLiga Lock Checker

GitHub repo: GitHub repo: agustim/laliga-lock-checker

Summary of key features/benefits

• Go script to check if a set of domains are blocked and, if necessary, test them through a VPN. The results are saved in a CSV file with time, status and latency. • Read domains from a JSON file ( sites.json). • It makes HTTP requests and checks if they respond. • If they don’t respond, activate a VPN connection (WireGuard) and try again. • Write the results to a CSV file: hora,domini,estat,latencia_ms. • It allows you to configure it via command line, environment variables or .env.

LaLiga Lock Checker is available on GitHub

LaLiga IP List

GitHub repo: GitHub repo: r4y7s/laliga-ip-list

Summary of key features/benefits

• This repository maintains a whitelist of legitimate IPs that have been unintentionally affected by judicial IP blocks in Spain ordered by LaLiga as part of its anti-piracy efforts, based on public data from hayahora.futbol. • The file laliga_ip_list.txt is updated twice a day automatically. • What’s inside? The laliga_ip_list.txt file includes legitimate IPs that were wrongly blocked during football match streams in Spain, affecting services like: RAE (Royal Spanish Academy), universities and research centers, news outlets, sponsor and club websites

———–

Whether the existence of these tools amounts to evidence of overblocking, remains to be seen. But one thing is certain.

Providing an environment that necessitates circumvention, so that people can go about their legal business, runs counter to the prevention of piracy and so much more.

It undermines the entire site-blocking movement, and provides new credibility and moral legitimacy to anything that stands in its way – or indeed, tunnels straight through it.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

From TorrentFreak via this RSS feed

In recent months, piracy-related overblocking concerns in Italy and Spain have reached new highs.

Rightsholders successfully advocated for broader blocking measures. While these may indeed be more effective, they have also resulted in a noticeable increase in overblocking reports.

For example, Italy’s “Piracy Shield” blocked access to Google Drive, CDN providers, and other legitimate sites and services. Meanwhile in Spain, overblocking is now the de facto standard, as the result of continued disagreement between football rightsholder LaLiga and Cloudflare.

Tensions remain high. Major tech companies have chimed in with calls for a more balanced approach, while some rightsholders see broader blocking action as the best way forward. Meanwhile, gestures to limit overblocking have reportedly found themselves stranded in a black hole.

.Cat Domain Registry

While it’s near impossible to cover all developments, our attention was recently drawn to a response from an organization that hasn’t raised its voice before; the Catalan domain name registry ‘PuntCAT foundation’, which manages the .cat TLD.

The PuntCAT registry allows organizations and individuals to associate with and promote the cultural Catalan identity. This includes the prominent football club Barcelona, which is currently leading the LaLiga championship.

The FCBarcelona.cat domain name doesn’t use Cloudflare and has not been inadvertently caught up in piracy blocking activities. However, other .cat domains have been affected, the registry recently confirmed.

Registry Alerts Customers and Tracks Abuse

PuntCAT reportedly heard from several customers whose websites were blocked by local ISPs, even though they have no association with football or piracy. In response, the registry alerted all customers who use Cloudflare to warn them about potential future problems.

“In recent weeks, some .cat domain holders have informed us that access to their pages, which have no connection to the broadcast of football matches, have been restricted during the broadcasts of La Liga matches,” the email begins.

Email sent to .cat Cloudflare users

PuntCAT launched an investigation following these reports and, with help from experts, found that 2,294 .cat domains use Cloudflare as a proxy to improve the security and accessibility of the associated websites.

All at-risk customers were sent an email notification and via its website, the registry informed the public that in February alone, sites with more than 400,000 visitors were affected.

Registry Doesn’t Rule Out a Legal Response

While the registry is not yet directly involved in the dispute, it decided to step up and actively monitor .cat domains for overblocking issues. This real-time monitoring allows it to take swift countermeasures if needed, potentially including legal action.

“If these undue blockages are confirmed, we commit to acting decisively to protect the quality of the service we offer our users, reserving the right to take legal action and to collectively represent the owners of the affected domains,” PuntCAT wrote in the email.

Thus far, the registry hasn’t taken action. However, the fact that core Internet services, including ICANN-accredited domain registries, are concerned about the escalating blocking measures shows that these issues impact the broader ecosystem.

Ironically, these problems come at the worst possible time, as the United States is currently considering its own site blocking legislation. Opponents of the U.S. plans, including EFF, will likely use these overblocking examples to show how site-blocking can spiral out of control.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

From TorrentFreak via this RSS feed

Adult entertainment company Flava Works specializes in gay media, mostly pornographic films and magazines featuring Black and Latino men.

Over the years, the company has built a reputation for aggressively pursuing legal action against individuals accused of sharing its copyrighted content, often via private torrent sites specializing in gay content. Flava is known for identifying ordinary downloaders and those who leak their content, presumably through use of unique identifiers embedded in official videos.

Many hundreds of alleged pirates have been targeted in these legal actions, including a Hollywood executive who fought back in court. After a retaliatory lawsuit was dropped, the case was eventually settled on undisclosed terms.

In other lawsuits, Flava clearly came out on top, including a damages claim of $1.5 million against a defendant who shared seven films.

Flava’s lawsuits appeared to slow down in recent years, but a new complaint filed at an Illinois district court shows that the production company continues to monitor pirates, including those in private communities.

Lawsuit Targets Alleged Leaker & 47 File-Sharers

The complaint by Flava Works Entertainment and affiliate Blatino Media, lists Canadian resident Nicolas G. as the main defendant. Allegedly a paid subscriber to the plaintiffs’ official websites, the defendant is said to have downloaded several films and then shared some of them on private torrent tracker GayTorrent.ru, which is also accessible at GayTor.rent.

Flava accuses the Canadian defendant of downloading copyrighted videos and distributing them on the torrent platform, in violation of its terms of service.

“Defendant [Nicolas G.] downloaded copyrighted videos of Flava Works as part of his paid memberships and, in violation of the terms and conditions of the paid sites, posted and distributed the aforesaid videos on other websites, including websites with peer-to-peer sharing and torrent technology,” the complaint reads.

The complaint

The legal paperwork doesn’t specify how the main defendant was linked to the pirated videos, but it’s likely they contained embedded identifiers. Flava alleges that as a result of the unauthorized sharing, dozens of members of the private torrent site were able to download the pirated videos.

These downloaders, 47 in total, are listed as John Doe defendants. They’re currently identified only by their respective usernames, including ActorCA, Balloonboy82, Furiousd2023, TheMonitor72, and WarGod83. All face direct copyright infringement claims and a risk of substantial damages.

Millions in Damages

The complaint is brief and doesn’t include any details explaining how the defendants were tracked or identified. The main defendant likely had personal details linked to their paid Flava account, but what evidence exists to show that the alleged users of the site downloaded pirated films is unknown.

The scale of the damages claim is clear. For each of the 47 John Doe defendants the plaintiffs request $150,000 in statutory damages. The main defendant faces a significantly larger claim of $1,500,000, pushing the total damages claim to over $8 million.

Damages

Again, no reasons are provided to justify these amounts but $150,000 is the maximum available for copyright infringement of a single work. The lawsuit was filed with a list of 31 copyrighted works, but no details to show who shared what and when. It’s possible that more details will emerge as the case progresses.

All in all, the recent complaint shows that after more than a decade, Flava is still actively monitoring BitTorrent pirates. While new lawsuits are rare, they are not without consequence and should not be ignored. The fact that Flava’s name previously appeared in multiple bankruptcy proceedings says enough.

—

A copy of the complaint, filed by Flava Works Entertainment, Inc. and Blatino Media, Inc at the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, is available here (pdf)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

From TorrentFreak via this RSS feed

Having listened to LaLiga chief Javier Tebas speak about piracy for almost an hour at a conference recently, several things become apparent.

Whether one agrees or disagrees with his stance on how to tackle piracy, in particular the blocking controversy that has dogged Spain since early February, at a time of crisis this would be the man to have fighting your corner. He’s passionate about his mission, knows exactly what needs to be done, and is as unmovable as he is uncompromising on how to get there.

For these reasons and many more like them, what some argue is a football business problem is already developing into a potential problem for everyone. Tebas believes the financial impact of piracy on Spanish football is currently between 600 and 700 million euros and with the recently confirmed authority awarded by a local court. LaLiga currently blocks 3,000 IP addresses every weekend to reduce the damage.

Empowered By the Judiciary, LaLiga Blocks in Line With the Mission

During the weekend, hunting pirates (Tebas prefers the term ‘martians’) starts at noon on Saturday and ends between eleven and midnight; rinse and repeat on Sunday. If it transpires that all 3,000 IP addresses belong to Cloudflare, LaLiga will block however many it sees fit.

Tebas acknowledges that each Cloudflare IP can in theory protect 1,000 to 2,000 non-pirate IP resources. It necessarily follows that, if blocking is effective, those ordinarily neutral web resources will be rendered inaccessible along with any offending pirate sites, for as long blocking remains in place. Tebas blames Cloudflare for using these innocent resources as ‘human shields’ and at the same time points to just a handful of cases he considers to be verified, genuine complaints.

Other complaints of overblocking are variously described as overblown or non-genuine, and collectively as just “noise.”

“Google has even paid communication agencies to say that there’s been a lot of noise, that there have been some barbaric outages,” Tebas alleged. “I’m convinced that when Google Drive was cut [by Piracy Shield] in Italy, it was with Google’s awareness. With real Google awareness, and I’m going to tell you why it’s like that.”

CDN77: Like Cloudflare But Smaller and Cooperative

CDN77 is a well-known CDN that specializes in live video and VOD. It may be smaller than Cloudflare but still claims to deliver 300 PB of video daily. Tebas doesn’t mention the circumstances that led to its cooperation with LaLiga, but he does seem satisfied with the arrangement.

“We have a company that’s much smaller than Cloudflare, but it provides the same services. It’s a Dutch company, it’s important, but it’s not. It’s called CDN77 and it does the same thing [as Cloudflare] it anonymizes [users]. Well, we have an agreement with them,” he explains.

“During the the game, when we detect CDN77 IP addresses, we don’t block them, we notify [CDN77]. They directly remove the IP address that is sharing the illegal content, and replace it with another IP and then cut it off, that’s it, it can be done technologically.”

LaLiga: No Large-Scale Overblocking

Since early February, fundamental disagreement has persisted over a) the scale of overblocking and b) whether LaLiga’s blocking can be described as indiscriminate.

To the extent that indiscriminate suggests a random, scattershot approach, LaLiga’s objections do seem reasonable. LaLiga says it targets specific IP addresses used by identified IPTV services; it’s well understood that other services may be present on the same IP, but if the judge who issued the order saw no problem, who can insist otherwise?

In the eyes of LaLiga, the scale of the overblocking isn’t significant, but the numbers do seem to lack clear definition. That being said, Tebas is very clear on what it is not.

“It’s not true that there are millions of [blocked] users, as Cloudflare put it. If there are millions of users, and the judge himself says, you haven’t proven it, and they have had the opportunity to prove it, we are the ones who have proven that it’s not true. In other words, they had to prove it, because it’s not true,” Tebas explained.

Opposing View – Overblocking is Massive

Regular updates posted to X by sysadmin @jaumepons aim to document overblocking in Spain. According to their research, the scale is enormous but given the numbers and technical issues involved, independent verification from outside the country presents challenges.

Claims on X from within Spain

From a base of almost no overblocking according to LaLiga, to the massive overblocking alleged in these reports, it’s clear that both extremes can’t exist at the same time.

According to Cloudflare, various experts, and people whose websites become inaccessible in Spain when football airs on TV, feel that the evidence is on public display. LaLiga’s position is that since evidence wasn’t produced to the standard required by the court, claims of overblocking remain unproven; presumably that also extends to the IP addresses in the image below.

All were reportedly blocked by LaLiga, all belong to CDN provider CDN77 whose cooperation may not have provided immunity from blocking as initially envisaged.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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The Internet Archive is widely known for its Wayback Machine, which preserves copies of the web for future generations.

These archiving efforts, which started decades ago, will become more valuable over time. The same could apply to IA’s other projects, including the digitization of old books and records.

Seven years ago, the Archive began archiving the sounds of 78rpm gramophone records, a format that is obsolete today. In addition to capturing their unique audio characteristics, including all ‘crackles and hisses’, this saves unique recordings for future generations before the vinyl or shellac disintegrates due to age.

The ‘Great 78 Project‘ received praise from curators, historians, and music fans but not all music industry insiders were happy with it. Several record labels including Sony and UMG, sued the Internet Archive for copyright infringement in federal court in 2023.

Labels Seek $693 Million in Damages

Last year, IA responded to these allegations with a motion to dismiss. According to the Archive, many of the claims were simply too late, as they supposedly pointed to infringements that occurred over three years ago. The record labels claimed they were aware of this; the RIAA sent a cease and desist letter on their behalf but took no further action at the time.

The U.S. federal court in California disagreed. After reviewing the positions from both sides, Judge Maxine Chesney concluded that it wasn’t clear that the statute of limitations had expired for all works, as the RIAA’s letter didn’t mention any specific infringements.

The case moved forward and last month the music labels requested permission to file a second amended complaint, which significantly raises the stakes. This updated version includes 4,624 works that were allegedly infringed by the Great 78 Project, as opposed to the 2,749 recordings listed in the original complaint.

The music companies request the maximum statutory damages of $150,000 per work for each of these recordings, increasing potential damages to an astronomical $693 million.

Some of the recordings

Progress in Settlement Negotiations

The amended complaint has yet to be accepted by the court, but recent filings suggest that it may not get to that. Apparently, both camps have been engaged in settlement discussions that could potentially result in an alternative resolution.

In a joint filing, the parties asked the court to pause the lawsuit for thirty days so they can work on finalizing a deal. No terms are mentioned, but a resolution outside of court seems realistic.

Specifically, IA and the music labels state that they have “made significant progress in settlement discussions” and are “optimistic that settlement discussions may be successful and that this case can be dismissed.”

From the joint stipulation

The court granted the request and stayed the case for thirty days, canceling a hearing that was planned for Friday. If a settlement is reached, the case can be dismissed; if not, the parties will have to propose a new schedule.

At the time of writing, the Great 78 Project remains online. While several recordings have been removed since the lawsuit was filed, including a copy of Bing Crosby’s White Christmas, many others remain accessible.

It’s not clear what type of settlement the parties have in mind, but the labels will likely insist that all allegedly infringing content is removed. The Internet Archive, in turn, will likely try to avoid any substantial damages.

—

A copy of the joint stipulation and the proposed order to stay the case for thirty days, granted on April 4th, is available here (pdf). A copy of the proposed amended complaint with the 4,624 works can be found here (pdf)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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More than a year after its official debut in February 2024, Italy’s controversial Piracy Shield blocking system is yet to deliver on the key predictions justifying its launch.

Claims of piracy’s total elimination quickly evaporated, taking predictions of major economic benefits down with them. The pirate sites causing the issues are now rarely mentioned by the authorities. Instead, telecoms regulator AGCOM and major football rightsholders have sought to toughen up legislation, and through a current public consultation, amend copyright protection regulations.

Public Consultation

Proposals for new technical and operational changes were reported last month. Hampered by the veil of secrecy surrounding Piracy Shield and its operations, input from the public has little chance of being taken seriously. Fortunately, the most important issues won’t go unaddressed.

A submission dated April 3 by the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA) is notable for the members it represents; global tech giants such as Amazon, Apple, Cloudflare, Google, and Meta, among others.

“Like many other operators in the digital sector – whether based in Italy, in other EU Member States, or outside of Europe, – we have been expressing serious concerns about Italy’s Piracy Shield, which AGCOM has chosen as a tool for issuing orders to block internet sites (i.e. within the very short time frame of 30 minutes),” CCIA’s submission reads.

“These requests are made by rightsholders without due process or possibility for recourse. Hence, we believe that the Piracy Shield poses significant risks to the principles of freedom of enterprise expression, as established by European and Italian law.”

Piracy Shield Risk Factors

The basic factors said to contribute to these risks are well known. The Piracy Shield system was developed by a company affiliated with football league Serie A, one of the few companies currently allowed to use it. The technical features of Piracy Shield have never been made public and participation in the technical committee was by invite only and few operators from the digital sector were invited.

Subsequent operational errors, including overblocking affecting Cloudflare and Google Drive, also feature in the submission, but the specifics can be found in the regulatory amendments proposed by CCIA.

(Note: Machine translations may lack nuance, original documents included below for reference)

Proposed Changes to Regulations

According to CCIA, Article 8, paragraph 3 of AGCOM’s draft, awards AGCOM the power to issue orders to remove content from servers hosted outside Italy (in other EU Member States), based on a reference to provisions in the Digital Services Act (DSA).

While the provision to which AGCOM refers is unknown, establishing the scope of AGCOM’s jurisdiction is important. To that end, CCIA calls on AGCOM to identify the provision “that you believe to establish this extra-territorial power.”

On the same theme, CCIA takes issue with paragraph 4 directly after.

The issue here begins with the assertion that AGCOM should be awarded powers to issue orders to remove content from servers hosted outside Italy. AGCOM currently has the authority to compel Italian ISPs to block access to servers, usually foreign, to prevent those servers being accessed by users in Italy.

Given the similar end result, CCIA notes that when it was previously envisaged that AGCOM should be awarded local blocking power, that was promoted “precisely with specific reference to the hypothesis of servers located beyond national borders, as a substitute for the direct order of removal.”

References to the Digital Services Act

That AGCOM intends to make use of provisions available under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) is a complication, especially when the provisions aren’t made clear, as the ‘extra-territorial’ example above shows.

Further DSA-related issues quickly raise their heads too, specifically concerning Article 9, Orders to act against illegal content. The relevant sections below from the DSA (EU law) and AGCOM’s reference to that law, are followed by a comment from CCIA.

A second translation of CCIA’s comment (in yellow) reads as follows: “Provision should be made for compliance with the formal requirements for authority orders in Article 9 of the Digital Services Regulation, referred to in this same rule as the source of the information obligation.”

This statement may serve as a reminder that removal orders issued under Article 9 of the DSA impose a reporting obligation on intermediary recipients. However, for an order to be considered valid under Article 9, the issuer must ensure that takedown orders contain the following at minimum:

(i) the legal basis for the order under EU/national law (ii) a statement explaining why the information is illegal, (iii) information to identify the issuing authority, (iv) clear information enabling the intermediary to identify and locate the illegal content, (v) information about redress mechanisms available, (vi) details of the authority to receive information about the effect given to the orders.

Major Concerns Over Draft Regulations in Article 10

The real dispute takes place around Article 10, Precautionary proceedings for violations relating to audiovisual content broadcast. To appreciate the gulf between AGCOM’s stance and that of CCIA’s members, the first page of proposals tackle several fundamental issues that AGCOM has thus far refused to discuss.

Basics include the requirement that when AGCOM issues a blocking order, a timeframe of 30 mins to implement it safely isn’t realistic. Five days, on the other hand, is too short for those wrongfully blocked to file an appeal. Calls for improved transparency have also fallen on deaf ears, but the full list goes on…..and on.

A gulf of disagreement

CCIA concludes its submission with a request for a dedicated hearing but before that, the tech industry group urges AGCOM to reconsider its approach.

“We take the opportunity to encourage AGCOM to reconsider its blocking approach and instead focus its efforts on targeting the actual hosts and distributors of pirated content and on protecting content at the source,” CCIA’s submission adds.

“Network-level blocking does not remove content from the internet, can easily be circumvented and is ultimately ineffective in combating piracy, reducing infringing content, or deterring sophisticated piracy tactics.”

CCIA’s summary is available here (pdf), the full set of proposals here (docx, Italian)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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With the continued growth of pirate IPTV services in recent years, TV broadcasters and distributors have been ramping up their anti-piracy efforts.

The International Broadcaster Coalition Against Piracy (IBCAP) has been particularly active. It’s also the main driver behind a new lawsuit filed yesterday by DISH Network at a Texas federal court.

Lemo TV & Kemo IPTV

The American pay-TV provider accuses the operators of popular streaming services ‘Lemo TV’ and ‘Kemo IPTV’ of direct copyright infringement. These services, operating from Lemotv.com and Kemoiptv.com respectively, promise access to “over 18,000 live channels” and “over 8,400 shows” for a fraction of the price of legal subscriptions.

“Defendants offer United States Subscribers a 36-hour free trial to the Service and sell Service Subscriptions for one device for $28.50 for six months, $39 for one year, $59 for two years, and $100 for four years,” the complaint notes.

Lemo TV

In addition to selling direct to consumers, both services operate reseller programs. This allows third parties to launch their own custom-branded IPTV streaming sites and apps for under $200. Resellers purchase credits for use with their branded services which they can resell to their own customers at a significant markup.

In a footnote, DISH claims that resellers of Lemo TV and Kemo IPTV include the following: Xtremehdiptv.org, Bestusiptv.com, Slingtvbox.com, 1dollariptv.com, Fubo-iptv.com, Tv-wave.com, Kemoiptv.shop, Geministreamz.us, Honeybeetv.com, Honeybeeiptv.org, Honeybeeiptv.io, Dynastyiptv.shop, Dynastyiptv.com, Dynasty-iptv.com, Caliptostreams.com, and 4kliveiptv.com.

Reseller offer

Unveiling the John Doe Operators

The complaint alleges Lemo and Kemo use the services of Cloudflare and Namecheap, which are both based in the United States. However, the identities of the operators remain unknown. DISH hopes to uncover more information through this lawsuit so it can name the defendants in an amended complaint.

To gather more information, DISH filed a motion to expedite discovery. Specifically, it seeks permission to subpoena a wide variety of third-party intermediaries who may be able to help identify the defendants.

These include Cloudflare and Namecheap, but also other hosting companies, payment providers, and social media services such as 24 Shells, Des Equity, Hivelocity, Tucows, GoDaddy.com, DigitalOcean, Newfold Digital, Google, Coinbase, PayPal, Meta Platforms, and X Corp.

The discovery request is not limited to the main Lemo and Kemo domains, but also includes the alleged reseller services, as shown below.

Discovery Request

$25 Million in Damages

The lawsuit mentions that at least 171 registered copyrighted works were infringed and DISH seeks the maximum of $150,000 in statutory damages for each, totaling over $25 million. In addition, the complaint seeks an injunction to transfer the infringing domain names.

While their identities are currently unknown, DISH believes that the defendants acted willfully and on a massive scale, ignoring approximately 100 notices of infringement sent by IBCAP and DISH since February 2021.

IBCAP executive director Chris Kuelling says that their anti-piracy lab classifies Lemo and Kemo among the most egregious IPTV services. During the first quarter of 2025, the services accounted for nearly 30% of all unauthorized streams detected on set-top box and IPTV services.

Based on this data, IBCAP helps its members to select the prime candidates for legal action, which ultimately resulted in this week’s lawsuit.

“This lawsuit is the latest example of our lab’s ability to identify the pirate services that are significantly infringing our members’ content and stack-rank such services in order to target and remove the worst infringers.”

“This level of theft is unacceptable for our members, and we will put a swift stop to it—just as we have successfully done with numerous other pirate services through court-ordered injunctions,” Kuelling adds.

—

A copy of the DISH Network complaint, filed yesterday at the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas, is available here (pdf)

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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Like many similar reports published most weeks by newspapers in Europe, an article published by Belgian media outlet L’Echo late Saturday evening pulled few punches.

The publication explained that after football broadcasters DAZN and 12th Player obtained authority from a local court for a new type of enforcement action, on Saturday Belgian ISPs blocked around 100 illegal streaming sites and five pirate IPTV providers. The measures were reportedly timed to take effect shortly before the start of the second day of the Belgian football championship play-offs, presumably to maximize the irritant effect of sudden pirate ssite blackouts.

“DAZN: First of Its Kind”

According to L’Echo, DAZN described the action as the “the first of its kind” and a “real step forward” in the fight against content piracy in Belgium. Comments like these are fairly standard in the anti-piracy arena, likewise claims that rightsholders have acquired a secret weapon capable of tipping the balance of power.

L’Echo’s report was much more balanced but if the various components came together as planned, major disruption of live match streams at a crucial point in the season seemed to have a real chance of success.

The groundwork was completed last month. An order issued by the Brussels Enterprise Court late March, authorized DAZN and 12th Player to engage in dynamic blocking boosted by a significant additional component.

While this would be its first use in Belgium, dynamic blocking is already used extensively elsewhere. The mechanism allows for speedy responses to blocking countermeasures, including domain changes and the appearance of proxies and mirrors, and there’s no requirement for a follow-up legal procedure.

Pirate sites are by now mostly familiar with dynamic blocking but in this case, the rightsholders also had an eye on spoiling a circumvention tactic popular with millions of users. Faced with blocking on Saturday, users in Belgium who switched from ISP-provided DNS to Cloudflare’s DNS wouldn’t have restored connectivity quite so easily. Moving to DNS provided by Google or Cisco may not have helped much either.

Cloudflare, Google, and Cisco Ordered to Block DNS Resolvers

Over the past several years, Cloudflare has faced several lawsuits that demanded pirate site blocking measures on its public DNS resolver. Rightsholders take the position that when ISPs implement DNS blocking, users shouldn’t be able to switch to a public DNS service like Cloudflare’s to regain access.

Those cases mostly focused on Cloudflare in Italy but a site-blocking case filed by Canal+ in 2023, concluded in 2024 with Cloudflare, Google, and Cisco ordered to prevent use of their DNS resolvers to access dozens of pirate sites.

In terms of platforms blocked in a single swoop, the order obtained by DAZN and 12th Player in Belgium may be even broader in scope.

New Law, New Blocking Momentum

New law passed in Belgium in 2022 aimed to strengthen rightsholders’ piracy-fighting capabilities. A new expedited judicial procedure at the Brussels Enterprise Court promised tougher measures such as dynamic blocking, and the creation of a new department within the Federal Public Service FPS Economy (SPF Économie).

Documents seen by TorrentFreak late last week include a notice penned by the Belgian Online Anti-Piracy & Illegal Gambling Office. The notice references a “regulatory order” to block public DNS resolvers, stemming from a court order concerning claims of copyright infringement against pirate streaming sites.

Domains For Blocking (public DNS resolvers) [dark square=domain unresponsive]

The notice does not mention DAZN or 12th Player by name but the nature of the domains (almost 140, all linked to illegal sports streaming sites) and the date of the notification (April 3, 2025) suggest a strong link to Saturday’s events. DAZN’s standing as a dominant rightsholder means the notice is unlikely to relate to anyone else.

Pro Site-Blocking ISPs

Site blocking has existed in Belgium for close to 15 years with The Pirate Bay an early target back in 2011. Until recently, however, site blocking measures have been quite patchy and lacked volume in general.

By the summer of 2024, DAZN and 12th Player were helping to push that trend in a different direction after obtaining an order to block around 90 pirate streaming sites offering content to which the companies own the rights.

Local ISPs Telenet NV, Proximus NV, Voo NV, and Orange Belgium NV were technically the defendants in that matter but the site blocking process in Belgium is completely non-adversarial. In February 2024, the CEOs of both Proximus and Orange openly spoke out in favor of site-blocking measures, with the former indicating they couldn’t come soon enough.

Resistance is Futile – and Expensive

Whether the Brussels Enterprise Court took the ISPs’ cooperation into account isn’t clear, but as far as we’re able to determine, the dynamic blocking order seems to have taken their compliance for granted. The same cannot be said of the operators of the public DNS resolvers, Cloudflare, Google, and Cisco.

The Court reportedly set penalties at €100,000 per day for non-compliance, a sharp turnaround from the status quo barely a year ago when public DNS resolvers mostly considered themselves too distant from infringement to be held liable. Given that the vast majority of the sites in the blocking order act as portals or indexes for content not even they host, links to direct infringement are distant indeed.

That raises the most important question of all: can blocking be considered successful if it doesn’t remove or even target the infringing streams that fuel the entire ecosystem?

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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Most prevalent in the movie and TV show sectors, applications for DMCA subpoenas are regularly filed at courts in the United States.

Aside from their intended purpose, DMCA subpoenas can provide useful clues about future anti-piracy strategies. When subpoenas are contested by intermediaries, subpoena applications sometimes become copyright cases in their own right. From a rightsholders' perspective, in some cases they may be the only potential source of information yet to be exhausted.

Getting Prepared

A few days ago, the UK's Premier League asked a California federal court to issue a DMCA subpoena against Cloudflare. The application identifies 38 target pirate streaming sites, many of which utilize multiple domains. Since the platforms all use Cloudflare, the Premier League hopes that information held by the company will help to unmask the sites' currently anonymous operators.

Before filing an application under Section 512(h) of the DMCA, which allows copyright owners to obtain a subpoena and receive “information sufficient to identify an anonymous infringer," applicants are first required to send DMCA takedown notices to the platform in question. The notices should identify the infringing content and state where the content can be found; in cases involving streaming sites, the right tools can prove helpful.

Recreating the Toolkit

The screenshot below shows a live match playing on a pirate streaming site. Culled from the Premier League's application, it provides clues that allow us to start identifying the tools in use and the problems they're likely to solve once combined with Open Source Intelligence (OSINT).

At a basic level in this context, OSINT can be almost any information made available on the internet. The screenshot is our primary source; it will help us identify the tools to recreate the toolkit, which in turn will use other public information sources to satisfy the requirements of the application.

M3U8 Sniffer

In this example it appears that when the Premier League visited the website sporttuna.pro, they were redirected to sporttuna.website and then to sporttuna.xyz (boxed in red).

Like most pirate sites, the 'backend link' or source of the stream (boxed in green) isn't on public display. These links can be obtained in various ways but in this case, Chrome extension M3U8 Sniffer is the weapon of choice.

M3U8 Sniffer

From the developer 's website: The extension intercepts visited web page's network requests and identifies all m3u8 video stream URLs. When a m3u8 URL request is found, it is displayed in a box that overlays the visited web page (see images above) from which you can copy the m3u8 URL or play the video stream. Also, you can open the extension's popup window to view the first and last m3u8 URLs found for each site, as well as to set a variety of extension options.

M3U8 Sniffer is afree extension available from the Chrome Web Store. Further information is available from the developer at SnifferTV.com.

Identifying the Remaining Tools

Identifying the remaining tools was a little time-consuming but if we said the method was advanced or complicated, that would be a lie.

We simply trawled through the browser evidence images and took screenshots of the toolbars. These contain the icons of the apps used to obtain the evidence.

After extracting the toolbar icons we put those we recognized to the side, then identified the remainder using reverse image search tools. Straightforward options include Google Images and Google Lens.

As an alternative, Chrome extension RevEye Reverse Image Search provides instant results from Google, Bing, Yandex, and TinEye.

(Note: Bad extensions exist, trust nobody,check the source)

Internet Download Manager

Given that M3U8 Sniffer "does NOT provide functionality to download the actual video streams" another piece of software comes in handy. IDM is a popular choice in the niche and appears to be the downloader of choice in this particular toolkit.

From the official website: When you click on a download link in a browser, IDM will take over the download and accelerate it. You don't need to do anything special, just browse the Internet as you usually do. IDM will catch your downloads and accelerate them. IDM supports HTTP, FTP, HTTPS and MMS protocols.

Unfortunately, IDM isn't free but it is free to try via a 30-day trial. Some prefer JDownloader since the price is more predictable, but there are plenty of options in this niche.

Fiddler

Our best guess at identifying this next tool comes with a small caveat that its icon was almost impossibly blurred and even when fresh it's still pretty basic. Ultimately, a green diamond and a single white 'F' works here.

Fiddler and tools with similar functionality (web debugging proxy tools) are used extensively by developers and investigators when keeping a close eye on HTTP traffic is a must. For those who've never cared to take a closer look, it can be real eye-opener. Even the most innocuous websites can behave pretty badly until users notice, so there's never a bad time to take a first look.

Fiddler Classic and Fiddler Everywhere are both available as free trials, and the same is true for Charles Proxy which appears regularly as evidence in Indian site-blocking cases.

Some prefer to monitor traffic with Wireshark but for others it can be too much. Open source and available on Linux, Windows (GUI), and macOS, MITM Proxy will scratch most itches for free.

At a pocket friendly price of $0.00, the open sourceMITM Proxy (man-in-the-middle) does exactly as its name suggests, making it a popular choice.

Instant Datascraper

Scraping data from websites in a structured and usable format isn't always easy and for big jobs, things can quickly descend into a time-wasting nightmare.

Instant Data Scraper hopes to eliminate the frustrations often associated with scraping and with over a million users, people seem happy with the results.

It's impossible to say how the Premier League uses Instant Datascraper, but it could easily consume a visible members' list in an instant or scrape a mountain of forum posts. The options are only limited by data becoming unavailable.

From the official site: Instant Data Scraper is an automated data extraction tool for any website. It uses AI to predict which data is most relevant on a HTML page and allows saving it to Excel or CSV file (XLS, XLSX, CSV). This tool does not require website specific scripts, instead it uses heuristic AI analysis of HTML structure to detect data for extraction. This means that our scraping method works just as well with small and lesser known websites, as it does with global giants like Amazon. Also, our users do not need to have any coding, json or xml skills

The software is free and available direct fromwebrobots.io and the Chrome Store.

IPNetInfo | Investigator

IPNetInfo describes itself a small utility that allows people to easily find all available information about an IP address. That includes the owner of the IP address and sundry other details. Hosted on Nirsoft.com and GitHub respectively, both also have a bit more to offer.

Investigator is actually a collection of useful tools, one of which is bound to come in useful sooner or later. Developed by Nirsoft, IPNetInfo is surrounded by dozens of other useful free tools at Nirsoft.net so still worth a quick visit.

Those with access to a Linux command line also have access to the best tools when investigating domains, IP addresses, and DNS. For Windows users or those who simply prefer the convenience of GUIs, the following perform well and look great too: Digger Tools, DNSViz, URLQuery, DMNSApp, URLScan, and WebCheck.

Finally, a pair of outliers to consider.

The End: Emulators

Given that there are Android emulators that are less elaborate, more predictable, and therefore better suited to the assumed job in hand, the discovery of two fairly elaborate emulators in the toolkit initially seems a little puzzling.

There's bound to be a good reason they're installed but right now, those reasons will have to wait until another day.

[Content truncated due to length...]

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The frontline of online piracy liability keeps moving, and core internet infrastructure providers are increasingly finding themselves in the crosshairs.

In a significant ruling last week, the Paris Judicial Tribunal ordered Cloudflare to actively block access to pirate MotoGP streams, confirming that third-party intermediaries can be required to take responsibility.

The ruling follows a complaint from French entertainment powerhouse Société d'Edition de Canal Plus (SECP), which holds the rights to various sports broadcasts. In this case, the proceeding was filed to protect its interests in MotoGP events, which started a new season last month.

DNS Resolvers are Liable

The reasoning behind the blocking request is similar to a previous blocking order, which also targeted OpenDNS and Google DNS. It is grounded in Article L. 333-10 of the French Sports Code, which empowers rightsholders to seek court orders against any outfit that can help to stop 'serious and repeated' sports piracy.

This time, SECP's demands are broader than DNS blocking alone. The rightsholder also requested blocking measures across Cloudflare's other services, including its CDN and proxy services.

The 14 domain names

The legal paperwork cites 14 domain names, including motogpstream.me and livestreamhd247.live, but doesn't stop there. SECP also pushed for dynamic blocking, asking Cloudflare to act against future infringing sites identified by French media regulator, ARCOM.

Cloudflare's Failed Defense

Cloudflare put up a defense, arguing that unlike traditional ISPs, it isn't the kind of intermediary that's targeted by Article L. 333-10. The company said that its DNS, CDN, and reverse proxy services don't "transmit" infringing content in the way envisioned by the law. Instead, they merely route traffic or cache content passively, so strict policing obligations are not appropriate.

Cloudflare also attacked the proportionality and effectiveness of the requested measures. For example, it said that DNS blocking would affect a "negligible" number of users and could be easily bypassed by VPNs or other DNS resolvers, rendering these restrictions futile.

Cloudflare also warned that due to technical challenges, it could be difficult to accurately geo-restrict blocking measures to France, introducing a new risk of global collateral damage.

Court Dismisses Pushback, Orders Blocking Measures

None of these defenses convinced the Paris court, which rejected all of Cloudflare's arguments. For example, it disregarded the "passive" vs. "active" distinction, concluding that intermediaries such as Cloudflare play an integral role in accessing pirate streams. As a result, the company is required to block this content.

The potentially limited effect of the blocking order didn't change the court's view either. While Cloudflare's blocking won't put an end to piracy, it will have an impact, even if some people bypass the proposed blocking measures.

All in all, the Paris Court ordered Cloudflare to comply and block the listed pirate site domains within three days. The blockades should stay in place for the remainder of the 2025 MotoGP season, across all relevant services.

Future Pirate Site Domains are Covered

The order was issued last week and Cloudflare has already implemented it, with the court allowing Cloudflare to adopt its own technical measures. Visiting the blocked domain names from France will now result in an HTTP 451 error, indicating that they are now unavailable for legal reasons.

Error HTTP 451

Interestingly, the blockades may not stop at the 14 domain names mentioned in the original complaint. The 'dynamic' order allows SECP to request additional blockades from Cloudflare, if future pirate sites are flagged by French media regulator, ARCOM. Refusal to comply could see Cloudflare incur a €5,000 daily fine per site.

"[Cloudflare is ordered to implement] all measures likely to prevent, until the date of the last race in the MotoGP season 2025, currently set for November 16, 2025, access to the sites identified above, as well as to sites not yet identified at the date of the present decision," the order reads.

From the order

This latest French ruling is part of broader efforts by rightsholders to co-opt core internet infrastructure into their enforcement efforts. Mandatory blocking requirements, once largely confined to ISPs, are now gradually expanding to other intermediaries. The expansion is not just a French or European phenomenon; a proposed U.S. site blocking bill also envisions a key role for DNS resolvers.

_--

A copy of the Paris Court order, issued on March 28, 2025, is available here (pdf) _

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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When rightsholders feel that conditions are optimal, site-blocking measures are presented to countries as a proportionate, precise, and entirely reasonable response to rampant piracy.

Should there be a need for new legislation, care should be taken to provide room for rightsholders to maneuver, to ensure that adaptive pirates are placed under maximum continuous pressure.

Under intense pressure itself by an impatient United States demanding that piracy needed to be taken more seriously, Spain spent years doing just that. The success story includes over a decade of site-blocking that generated zero controversy.

Piracy blocking applications even appeared to decline in 2024. A far cry from the days when a call-out on the USTR's Priority Watch List seemed inevitable, but still light years adrift from the disaster playing out in Spain since February.

With Great Power Comes….Massive Blocking

In 2022 LaLiga and Telefonica, owner of broadcaster Movistar, found room for legal maneuver. Understandably frustrated that their premium live sports broadcasts were instantly pirated, the companies convinced a court that rapid, dynamic blocking would be a proportionate response to IPTV piracy.

These blocking orders presented new problems. The crisis currently playing out in Spain shows how easily circumvented technical restrictions can be rendered almost useless. This, in turn, triggered a disproportionate response leading to substantial collateral damage.

When enhanced privacy features at Cloudflare undermined blocking, the power of a new court order issued last December allowed LaLiga to block Cloudfare itself and by default, many thousands of innocent Cloudflare customers.

Block and Awe

After a court rejected appeals by Cloudflare and hacker collective RootedCON in March, LaLiga now appears to be blocking whatever it needs to block to get the job done. And it's a big job, as updates from sysadmin @jaumepons on X reveal.

300 of 12382 domains behind 1 IP address

According to @jaumepons, Cloudflare IP addresses are currently being blocked by LaLiga at the rate of 3,000 every week. For perspective, Italy's Piracy Shield caused uproar when it blocked less than a handful.

Each IP address serves thousands of innocent Cloudflare customers and whichever pirate streaming service happens to be taking cover among them.

Despite having no links to pirate sites, the number of domains said to be affected by IP address-based blocking appears to be disproportionate to the stated aim. The claim that many newspapers have been caught up in the dragnet is concerning; the claim below is more disconcerting than anything else.

????

Unsolicited Press Release

While we're generally averse to parroting press releases without broader context, a communication received late Wednesday piqued our interest and then proved unusually puzzling. The author is the Spanish non-profit DigitalES and at the time of writing the release doesn't appear on the group's website. Its intentions, however, are made clear right off the bat:

_DigitalES, the Spanish Association for Digitalization and the employers ' association for the telecommunications, technology, and digital innovation sectors, is calling for the cooperation of all Internet intermediaries to ensure compliance with the court order requiring the blocking of resources linked to pirated audiovisual content.

---snip---

This court ruling is based on the material impossibility of implementing DNS-level blocking as a measure against online piracy. The main reason is that websites with illegal content and the intermediary companies that connect them to the internet employ various techniques (such as ECH or Relay) to change their IP addresses and circumvent these restrictions. Therefore, the most viable solution is considered to be either directly blocking the IP addresses associated with pirated content, or a combined strategy that includes blocking domains, URLs, and IP addresses .

Despite the agreement reached with most of these web traffic intermediaries to implement this solution, some services are not implementing the court order._

Whether the overblocking situation is linked to lacking implementation at some providers isn't clear. In fact, the press release doesn't mention overblocking at all; it notes the failed legal actions by Cloudflare and RootedCON but says nothing about the controversial events that triggered them.

Other Relevant Details

It may be a coincidence that Telefonica, Vodafone, MásOrange, and DIGI, are directly linked to the blocking action in Spain, while also being members of DigitalES. That no mention is made of these companies in the DigitalES press release might be an oversight, but with vested interests in how the current situation plays out, a few extra details of their involvement may prove informative.

The blocking injunction obtained last December was a joint effort by LaLiga and Telefónica Audiovisual Digital (TAD), which operates the Telefonica-owned subscription digital TV platform known as Movistar Plus+. In January it was reported that Telefonica had retained the domestic rights to broadcast LaLiga matches until the end of 2026/27 season, in a deal worth €1.29bn (US$1.43bn).

The injunction protects this investment by providing the legal basis for blocking measures at four named ISPs;

• MásOrange: Operator of brands including Orange, Yoigo, Jazztel, Masmovil, Simyo, Pepephone, Lebara, Lyca, Llamaya, and Euskaltel. An agreement between Orange and Telefonica-owned Movistar and DAZN secured broadcasting rights for LaLiga matches.
• Vodafone: LaLiga matches are available on Vodafone TV through a deal with DAZN
• DIGI: Romanian telco sells access to LaLiga matches via its DIGI TV platform in Spain
• Movistar: Telefonica-owned telco (LaLiga shown on Movistar+)

The process through which blocking injunctions are obtained is typically non-adversarial. Ultimately signed-off by a judge, ISPs are indeed compelled to implement piracy blocking measures, albeit under pre-arranged terms to which they all agreed.

The theory is straightforward. LaLiga/Telefonica monitor the internet for pirate streams and send their IP addresses to the ISPs. Once the ISPs add those IP addressees to their internal blacklists, their own customers watching those streams can no longer do so.

The companies believe that with enough disruption, pirates will decide to go legal. How well that's going right is unclear. The massive overblocking of Cloudflare denies access to legitimate platforms for pirates and non-pirates alike.

A Surprise Intervention

According to RootedCON, Vodafone surprised by intervening in its case.

_One of the most controversial points in the development of the case has been Vodafone 's intervention: before the judge made a decision, it appeared to reject RootedCON's presence in the legal process. The operator maintained, now with the support of the judge, that the only ones entitled to challenge the ruling were the operators that were sued at the time by LaLiga and Telefónica.

However, they themselves have not filed their own request for annulment. "What Vodafone is effectively saying is that operators are happy to be forced to block."_

And as distributors of LaLiga content, purchased at considerable expense, that makes complete sense. As internet service providers knowingly blocking legitimate resources and their own non-pirating customers? Not so much.

From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

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