Founded back in 2011, Uptobox rapidly gained popularity by making it easy for users to upload, store, and share files with others online. In April 2023, Uptobox received 34 million visits from users all over the world, around a third of those from France.

At several points in its dozen or so years online, Uptobox faced adversity, mostly due to copyright issues. Last May, the site was blocked by French ISPs but determined to stay online, Uptobox provided its users with advice on how blocking could be circumvented.

On September 20, 2023, not even the most sophisticated techniques allowed users to connect to Uptobox servers. After obtaining authorization from a French court, the world’s largest entertainment companies, including Columbia, Paramount, StudioCanal, Warner Bros, Disney, Apple, and Amazon, descended on two datacenters used by Uptobox.

At Scaleway and OpCore, two cloud service providers based in Vitry-sur-Seine in the southeastern suburbs of Paris, servers were unplugged and seized as evidence in support of a civil action. The Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment eventually claimed responsibility and in a statement revealed that two French nationals were operating Uptobox from Dubai. It was always inevitable that the ‘criminal operators’ would find themselves shut down, ACE said.

Uptobox Said Little Until Recently

Given the gravity of any legal measures taken by a coalition with a combined worth expressed in triple-digit billions, Uptobox hasn’t said much over the past six months. Last December, via the service’s X account, the company said that all subscriptions had been frozen and would be extended. At a minimum, it would like users to get their files back .

Then on March 7, 2024, Uptobox appeared to offer more positive news. “Our position is to do everything to recover these servers and allow our users to recover their data, and more optimistically to resume our activity. Thank you all for your support,” a post to X revealed .

Dubai-based company Genius Servers Tech Fze is said to be the operator of Uptobox. It filed an appeal in October 2023 and the first hearing was held at the Paris judicial court a few days ago.

Server Costs Running to 75,000 Euros Per Month

Marc Rees of French publication l’Informé attended the hearing and had the opportunity to speak with Thomas Chalanset, Uptobox/Genius Servers’ attorney. He was critical of the seizure and the ex parte nature of the court order behind it.

“This is the first time the operator of the Uptobox/Uptostream service, Genius Servers Tech Fze has been able to present its case. The power of the companies in front of us must not let misleading appearances win the day,” Chalanset explained.

“The service risks being asphyxiated by server costs and the length of the proceedings, even if Genius emerges unscathed in terms of a conviction.”

Uptobox’s server bill currently runs to 75,000 euros per month and the current process has already been running for seven months. The nature of the case, currently in the hands of the public prosecutor, features parallel criminal proceedings for infringement filed by the plaintiffs. There are fears the process could run for years.

“Blocklist Inclusion Supported Seizure Operation”

Documents seen by l’Informé indicate that the movie companies used Uptobox’s inclusion on blacklists as justification for the seizure operation to go ahead. The first, the European Commission’s Counterfeiting and Piracy Watch List , mentioned Uptobox in its 2022 edition.

However, as the service’s attorney Thomas Chalanset points out, the European Commission “does not take any position” on any of the rightsholder allegations, including those below, that appear in the report. In any event, the Commission has never contacted Uptobox, Chalanset says.

Other actions against Uptobox all involved French regulator ARCOM; in respect of the first in 2023 , Uptobox claims to have received no correspondence and is now taking action to have the decision reversed. Two other judgments that resulted in the Uptobox domain being blocked by ISPs last year, are also being appealed.

No Different to Google Drive or Dropbox, Court Hears

According to l’Informé’s report on the proceedings, Thomas Chalanset informed the court that his client’s service is no different to Google Drive or Dropbox; if a complaint is received requesting the removal of infringing content, there’s an obligation to take it down.

Lawyers for the entertainment companies rejected the comparison; Google and Dropbox sell storage space, whereas Uptobox offered premium subscriptions with “18 features, only one of which relates to storage spaces. All the others aim to unblock access, downloading, and viewing of hosted files, for example to break the waiting time limit between two downloads or for viewing files.”

As for the comment about actioning takedowns in common with Google Drive and Dropbox, the studios highlighted a feature on Uptobox that restored files following receipt of a takedown notice. A test involving 68 infringing files revealed that half reappeared within two hours.

Some Users Are Pirates, Non-Infringing Files Get No Publicity

Chalanset conceded that pirates did use Uptobox, but these were just a tiny minority who wanted to accumulate enough ‘Premium’ points to pay for their five euro per month subscription. Uptobox also called on a pair of expert reports to counter claims from rights holders that 84% of the files on the platform were infringing. As per l’Informé (translated from French)

“[T]he Dubai company also produced two reports, one written by In Code We Trust, a consulting company, the other by Hubert Bitant, a legal expert at the Paris Court of Appeal. Their analysis shows that the vast majority of files hosted on Uptobox are not downloaded or viewed. In essence, 73.5% of the hosted files were not downloaded, while the rights holders estimate that 84% of the files are infringing.”

The statistical method used by the rights holders to identify pirated content stored on Uptobox also came in for criticism. Their approach reportedly involved visiting pirate sites that typically link to files hosted elsewhere, Uptobox included. However, by visiting pirate sites, most of the content on offer would obviously be infringing and shared in public; non-infringing content that isn’t shared in public, users’ personal files and photographs, for example, by their very nature simply wouldn’t appear on a pirate platform.

Whether the court found Uptobox’s appeal credible will be revealed when its decision is handed down in two months. It’s unclear if users will be able to retrieve any family photos at any point, but a stampede to discuss the matter in person before the court seems unlikely.

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

Press releases announcing the shutdown of yet another pirate site, more arrests, and what that means for the entertainment industry, are nothing out of the ordinary. In particularly busy periods, simply determining where one batch ends and another begins can present challenges.

Yet in many cases, even the most straightforward reports have much more going on just below the surface. An announcement published Monday by the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment is clear, quite detailed, but also conservative in respect of reporting events behind the scenes.

The matter involves the oldest and most likely the largest torrent site in Thailand, a platform described by the most powerful rightsholders in the United States as a priority enforcement target for at least seven years. Yet only now, 18 years after the site first launched, have local authorities taken any visible action.

If policy recently changed in Thailand, there’s no obvious indication of when that took place or what it might be. The official page to provide tips about illegal services on the police website still doesn’t work and known complications simmering in this particular case haven’t been mentioned either.

ACE Outlines The Main Facts

The key details, as reported by ACE on Monday, read as follows:

The Royal Thai Police’s Economic Crimes Department (ECD), with support from the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE), has raided four locations in Bangkok, Surin Province and Surat Thani. Four Thai nationals have been taken into custody and are expected to be formally charged with copyright offenses in the coming days.

Siambit.me was the largest torrent tracker site in Thailand with average monthly visits of 5.5 million, and which provided access to a huge range of Hollywood, international and Thai content.

The site had been in operation since 2005 and is known to regularly change its domain to avoid detection. According to statements by the Royal Thai Police, Siambit.me had over 100,000 VIP members and the operators were making an estimated 1.5 million baht (USD $41,000) on a monthly basis.

The 5.5 million visits reported here align exactly with data reported by SimilarWeb, so we’ll put that aside for now. The reference to 100,000 VIP members indicates those paying a fee each month. The lowest monthly fee reported recently was just 99 baht with the highest at 499 baht, so roughly $2.70 to almost $14.00 per month.

The higher monthly rate of $14.00 makes little to no sense in any context while the claim that 1.5 million baht was generated each month could in theory suggest around 15,000 members paying 99 baht each. If 100,000 members paid even the minimum rate each month, no figures from any source combine to produce a sensible total, so perhaps more information will emerge to clarify the situation.

Images of Police Action Emerge

Images that began circulating late last week seem to confirm that the authorities had good intelligence. Photographs such as the one featuring a server room below appear to have been taken at the home of the main suspect.

When trying to establish a timeline for the events reported a few days ago a confusing picture emerged. In fact, to make any sense of these events we needed to go back, not just days, but several weeks.

Thai Police & ACE Took Sites Down in January

On January 19, 2024, we provided background on an ACE announcement detailing the shutdown of 27 Thai-focused sites, each reliant on a common infrastructure provided as a service by the website IAMTHEME.com.

Around January 17, officers from the Central Investigation Bureau were preparing an operation to enforce the country’s strict pornography laws; in Thailand it’s illegal to distribute porn, possess it, or produce it.

The bureau’s target was the suspected operator of numerous sites including xxxporn678.com, 037movie-hd.com, dooball678.com, movie678.com, and 678-hd.com. The first domain seems to have majored on illegal adult content while the rest appeared to focus on pirated movies and pirated live football streams.

The common denominator for all sites was a) a reliance on services offered by IAMTHEME.com and b) offering porn illegally and/or generating revenue illegally from online gambling advertising.

Combinations like these are an effective way to attract Thai authorities, who will shut sites down and arrest their operators. And that’s exactly what happened here. Items seized included four computers, eight mobile phones, and more than a dozen bank accounts.

Dominoes Start to Fall

Not long after the operator of xxxporn678 and the other sites was arrested, police began investigating the operator of IAMTHEME. On or around February 2, he too was placed under arrest, most likely for similar reasons.

At some point, police determined that their latest suspect was either sourcing his porn and pirated movies from SiamBit or was otherwise connected to the site and/or its operator. That triggered a series of events that led to Thailand’s largest torrent site becoming the focus of the ACE announcement published on Monday.

A source who asked not to be identified said that police initially expanded their investigation to identify the person in charge at SiamBit. Armed with a search warrant dated February 7 issued by a local court, on February 9 they targeted the home of a man in his late thirties* suspected of running the group that controls the site.
*the suspect is believed to be either 38 or 40

According to the authorities, SiamBit had 10,000 VIP members, together paying around 1.5 million baht to its operators every month. For balance, we have also seen references to ‘100,000 members’ but without any mention of money. SiamBits’ tracker data obtained by TF shows a peak of almost a million peers while reporting over 200,000 members.

It’s possible that the focus will end up being a monetary value, but whether that will be linked to porn and gambling, copyright infringement, or both, is still unclear.

At least initially, police focused on suspected crimes under Section 287 of the Thai Penal Code. Section 287 makes it beyond clear that any kind of dealing in pornographic content is a criminal offense, punishable by a fine, a prison sentence, or both.

While we were able to positively identify all four main suspects by name and home address, details here are limited to their initials, arrest location, alleged role, and reported age.

CW : Sai Mai District. SiamBit operator and famous professional racing driver (38/40)
PB : Chatuchak District. Financial controller (54)
WNK : Surin Province. Website/systems administrator (42)
NSWW : Surat Thani Province. Administrator, community manager (53)

Several images made available by the authorities allegedly feature the suspected operator of SiamBits but whether all show the same person isn’t entirely clear.

On the top row, images one and two show the same person at the same location, dressed in a light blue t-shirt, face blurred. However, the person with his face obscured in image three at the bottom seems to more closely match press images of the racing driver named as the main suspect.

That raises the question of why the person in image three is wearing completely different clothes than those worn by the suspect in one and two.

Other apparent anomalies include the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment referencing the domain Siambit.me, which as far as we can establish is indeed the site’s main domain.

Locally there appears to be greater interest in Siambit.io, which at the time of writing redirects to Google. Meanwhile, the .me variant currently redirects to a Telegram channel with over 18,700 members.

Thai authorities confirm that their interest in SiamBit was raised due to complaints from companies in the movie industry. In its statement published yesterday, the anti-piracy group said that copyright infringement charges are expected in the next few days.

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

The Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment regularly announces site closures following enforcement action. Over the past seven years, hundreds of sites have fallen, but the supply of new threats currently seems inexhaustible.

The level of detail ACE makes available to the public varies, but it appears to be affected by several variables. Details of settlements are rare, as one might expect. Names of site operators even more so. In many cases, even the domain names of shuttered platforms receive no specific mention, at least beyond recognizable branding.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of information that ACE doesn’t officially release is the scale of presumably successful enforcement actions that receive no mention at all. The reasons for that are open for speculation but, since the complexity of the piracy landscape has grown out of all proportion in the last few years, there’s no shortage of options.

Yet Another New Batch Arrives

If ACE maintained a single public list of domains directly taken over, redirected, or otherwise commandeered, tracking them would be straightforward. As things stand the whole process is fragmented and, at any one point, the full picture isn’t always available from DNS, WHOIS, or similar records.

For example, a series of domains that recently began redirecting to the ACE portal don’t currently list the MPA as the domain owner. They include watchgameofthrones.co, watchfriendshd.com, watchhowimetyourmother.co, watchthesimpsons.co, and watchparksandrecreation.co.

At the time of writing, none of these domains use the MPA’s DNS servers either, which may (or may not) change in the days and weeks ahead. Indeed, it’s not unheard of for sites to redirect themselves to ACE for no obvious reason. In any event, visitors to these domains are currently redirected to the ACE portal, with an interesting anti-piracy side effect observed elsewhere.

People who visit Google hoping to ‘watch parks and recreation’ or ‘watch how I met your mother’ find themselves overwhelmed with former pirate links, all leading to ACE. In some cases, the links even outrank legal platforms like Amazon.

Other domains provably taken over in the past few days include typhoonlabs.tv and typhoonlabs.net. Both list the MPA as owner and both use the movie industry group’s DNS servers. However, back in November, the MPA was listed as the new owner of the domains when they were still assigned to the former owner’s DNS servers.

We can’t explain why that was the case and we don’t know why there hasn’t been an announcement regarding these seizures. One possibility is the existence of around 30 typhoonlabs and typhoonlabsiptv-branded domains still in rotation which may (or indeed may not) be connected to a similar service.

Since announcing the demise of one platform risks driving traffic to another with a similar name. In some cases, making no announcement at all may be the best option. Situations like this can’t be uncommon when attempting to tackle piracy on a global scale and may explain why so many cases go unreported.

MPA’s Domain Collection

Thanks to record numbers of domains being handed over to the MPA, the Hollywood group’s domain portfolio is larger today than ever before. The prospect of the collection growing exponentially isn’t off the table either.

While many pirate sites previously operated without issues from a single domain, today it’s not unusual for sites to have dozens, for reasons that include redundancy, obfuscation, and circumvention of measures such as ISP blocking and search engine downranking.

In contrast, some of the most iconic domains under MPA control, such as isohunt.com and hotfile.com, stand out in their own right, each with their own place in history. Spotting them among the other 3,100+ domains, reported by a Whoxy reverse WHOIS search, is still relatively easy. It’s unlikely to remain that way for long.

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

Despite MPA/ACE having enough investigators to field both teams in a football match, while players argue with an in-house referee in multiple languages, the state of piracy in North Africa and the Middle East presents a considerable challenge.

At the time of writing, over 150 deliberately confusing domains and subdomains, linked to around three dozen illicit football streaming sites, are redirecting to the ACE anti-piracy portal. The domains started to redirect on Saturday, still hadn’t finished on Sunday, and may not even be finished now.

No Announcement From ACE Just Yet

Faced with a risk of sudden domain suspensions, ISP blocking, or domains being penalized in search results due to persistent copyright complaints, it’s common for pirate sites to have a few domains at their disposal. There’s also a growing trend of sites with common ownership operating from dozens of confusingly-similar domains by design.

This strategy has the potential to complicate enforcement, including a not-insignificant chance of sites continuing under the guise of different ownership, even when on paper an entire operation has already been shut down. There are signs that some overseas site operators are finding opportunities by generating chaos on the surface, while remaining completely organized behind the scenes.

None of this provides immunity from enforcement measures, but confirming compliance becomes more complex.

The Football Piracy Ring

For the sake of clarity, subdomains and other distractions have been stripped from this sample of domains currently redirecting to the ACE portal.

livehd7.club, livekooora.tv, livekoora.io, live-koora-online.tv, live-kooora-tv.com, live-kooora-tv.net, live-koora.tv, kingshoot.club, kingfoot.live, kooora4.us, kooragoal.club, koora4live.club, koora2day.net, kora365.online, kooralive.io, kooora365.live, kora-tv.online, kora-online-tv.com, koraextra.club, koratvonline.net, kora-live.plus, kora-star-tv.live, kora-goal.net

One of the above domains, kooora4.us, shows how small changes can help to muddy the waters. The word ‘kura’ is Arabic for ball while ‘koora’ is broadly understood as relating to football; in this case, an extra ‘o’ appears in the mix while other domains contain one or two.

SimilarWeb data shows that traffic increased for kooora4.us during October at a time when traffic for a similarly-named domain was in steep decline.

Similar behavior can be seen across dozens of similar domains, although not always under common ownership or even in direct response to enforcement measures. Now redirecting to ACE, kooora4.us received 277.6K visits in December 2023, a peak now unlikely to return.

Kooragoal.club, another domain that began redirecting over the weekend, also increased its traffic in October before a decline set in the following month.

A quarter of kooragoal.club’s traffic came from Egypt, which along with Saudi Arabia and UAE, appears regularly in traffic reports for similar domains.

Most also receive traffic from countries including the United States, but the clear focus is North Africa and the Middle East, putting the sites firmly the crosshairs of ACE member, beIN Sport.

In November 2022, ACE settled with the operator of a series of websites with similar names, appearance, and functionality, to those that began redirecting this weekend.

While their operator agreed to shut them down, ACE acknowledged the existence of additional sites, noting that enforcement actions would continue.

Mirrored Fortunes & Those That Can Slip Away

At the time of writing, kooragoal.club (above) and kora-goal.net (below, right) are both redirecting to the ACE portal, having generated 1.16 million and 120.5K visits respectively during the period Oct 2023 to Dec 2023.

The chart to the right also includes kora-goal.com, which is currently operational and showing progress that closely mirrors the decline of kooragoal.club.

Both domains display a shift in fortune in early November before meeting in traffic terms in December, with kora-goal.com taking over as kooragoal.club prepared itself for redirection to ACE. Whether kora-goal.com is destined for new anti-piracy ownership or will go on to further boost its traffic is unclear.

Kooralive.io Had Significant Traffic

Between October and December 2023, kooralive.io received almost 2.1 million visits, so ACE will be pleased that its growth has already been curtailed. The interesting thing here is that kooralive.io had around 250K visits in October and then, almost if someone had simply flicked a switch , in November its traffic suddenly skyrocketed to around 1.8 million visits.

In at least some cases, this was achieved by redirecting traffic from other domains/subdomains operated by the same owner, to other domains/subdomains also owned by the same owner, which then redirected to subdomains on kooralive.io. Similar behavior can be observed on other domains which, unsurprisingly, are also operated by the same owner.

Getting Rid of the Roots

In addition to the domains listed as redirecting at the start of this article, it remained a question whether other domains with common ownership would also suffer the same fate, even if some had fallen out of use.

While ultimately it could prove impossible to weed out every last domain, showing links between the domains was surprisingly straightforward, and as far as we can see (a handful of outliers aside) all currently redirect to ACE.

Whether any agreement reached with the operator of the sites has enough teeth to prevent a resurgence is unknown.

At least for now, however, the removal of dozens of domains seems significant enough for a quick celebration before getting back to the job, which apparently never ends.

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

In the final days of 2023 as people were preparing to welcome in the new year, yet more pirate domains were being redirected or transferred into the hands of the MPA, presumably as part of a settlement agreement.

Among them were uhuseries.com, owlserieshd.com, and ahaseries.com, relatively popular streaming platforms targeting the Thai market. We gave the news a brief mention at the time but since MPA/ACE have certain procedures to follow, the official announcement was published yesterday.

It reveals that in addition to the above, several other domains were also rendered inoperable including Iamtheme.com, nunghub.com and aplayer.xyz, described by ACE as a back-end domain that hosted a “vast collection of U.S. and international TV shows and movies” estimated to contain around 78,000 titles.

ACE Partners With TrueVisions

According to ACE, the Uhuseries.com network of sites had been running since 2019, attracting an average of 1.3 million visitors per month, with most traffic originating in Thailand, the United States and the United Kingdom.

“Another successful ACE and TrueVisions collaboration has resulted in the shutdown of two of Thailand’s most notorious illegal streaming services,” said ACE anti-piracy chief, Jan van Voorn.

Sompan Charumilinda, Executive Vice Chairman of TrueVisions, expressed gratitude for the invaluable support of Thai law enforcement.

“We would like to thank the Economic Crime Suppression Division of the Royal Thai Police for their steadfast commitment to protecting intellectual property rights. Thailand can produce and distribute world-class local content, but we must protect content rights if the benefits are to be realized by the creative economy and the country as a whole,” Charumilinda added.

Don’t Forget to Mention Malware

In the current environment, no anti-piracy press release can be considered complete without an obligatory malware warning and, thankfully, this one didn’t buck the trend.

“Piracy sites such as Uhuseries.com and Iamtheme.com put consumers at risk of malware, undermine investment in the Thai content industry, and reduce tax contributions to the local government,” van Voorn added, describing the closures as a “win-win for all.”

Despite being all-inclusive, it’s difficult to disagree with that statement.

Instant Pirate Site Service

ACE says that 27 pirate sites that relied on Iamtheme.com for content and infrastructure are now offline. Given there’s little to suggest that security of operators or users was considered a priority, that might be a good thing.

Through ads on various online discussion platforms, people with little relevant experience were encouraged to buy a website template for the equivalent of $225. Once installed, the script would make them a pirate site owner/operator almost instantly.

As the image shows, TrueVisions content was available via an API which according to the ads, could be purchased on a subscription basis. The headline price of $225 is therefor less of a bargain than it first appears. However, the most concerning aspect (copyright infringement aside) is the promotion of these scripts to people with little to no relevant experience.

A key website selling the scripts offers to install the software on a server for people who don’t know how, but insists that if any changes are made to the script whatsoever, all customer support ends there and then. For someone with no technical skills, that’s a pretty clear invitation to leave everything well alone, including any attempt to apply any security fixes, in the unlikely event any are issued at all.

Advertising Eyesore

Assuming new pirate site owners aren’t concerned that a third party probably has root access to their server even after installation, it’s time to get the site ready for visitors. The first couple of lines in ads promoting these scripts link two key features; 1) Online movie-watching website script. 2) Responsive Design with VIP membership system.

There’s also a section on how to set up advertising to generate more revenue: “Can manage and edit website page details like advertising contact information, member payment notifications, advertising space rates, website information through the web page. There is no need to have knowledge of programming.”

Indeed, attempting to change any code means the end of customer support, so having no knowledge is presumably a big plus. However, if all goes to plan with the installation, script buyers could end up with a website looking like the one on the left below.

With a more-is-always-better approach towards intrusive, suspect advertising, the finished product on the right shows what can be achieved if site owners are prepared to put in the time and effort.

While anything that limits exposure to insecure platforms run by novices should be considered a plus, Thai internet users still appear to have options if they want to launch an insecure template site of their own.

Meanwhile, site users in search of the latest movies and TV shows are probably oblivious or at least indifferent to the security situation, despite epilepsy-inducing gambling advertising on the front page telling them everything they need to know.

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

During the past few hours, users of streaming site ahaseries.com hoping to access their favorite site would’ve met with disappointment.

The same also goes for those who attempted to access uhuseries.com and owlserieshd.com.

All three domains are now under the control of the Motion Picture Association, which in turn is directing visitors to the web portal of the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE). There they will be greeted by a message from ACE on behalf of the anti-piracy coalition’s members.

“WATCH LEGALLY,” the message reads. “There are more than 140 content providers/platforms around the world that offer legal access to your favorite movies and TV shows across a wide variety of devices.”

How much choice there is in Thailand may have influenced the choices made by visitors to the three sites mentioned above, but no matter where pirate sites are located, ACE is likely to be aware of their existence.

At a California district court last week, the signature of MPA and ACE content protection chief Jan van Voorn could be found on several DMCA subpoena applications. When signed off, they will compel third-party companies to hand over whatever information they hold on around 40 pirate sites. One of those listed, a popular multi-content site in South America, says that after a 13-year run online, it has already thrown in the towel.

How the rest will respond is unknown but as their traffic data suggests, the platforms in the spotlight are servicing dozens of millions of visits every month. There’s little doubt that ACE wants to turn that around.

The tables below show the domains listed in the MPA’s DMCA subpoenas and the allegedly infringing content. Also included is a general category (such as streaming or torrent) for the sites targeted, their traffic data for the most recent available month, and the third-party platform instructed to hand over user data to the MPA/ACE.

Domain	Content	Platform	Traffic*	Provider	Provider Type
MPA DMCA Subpoena Application ( 2:23-mc-00182 )			*SimilarWeb Traffic Data (Visits per Month)
filmize.tv	Fast & Furious 9	Streaming	4.3m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
hinatasoul.com	Tokyo Revengers	Streaming	1.9m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
anitube.vip	Tokyo Revengers	Streaming	3.0m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy

Total Traffic Per Month: 9.2 million visits

Domain	Content	Platform	Traffic*	Provider	Provider Type
MPA DMCA Subpoena Application ( 2:23-mc-00184 )			*SimilarWeb Traffic Data (Visits per Month)
mixdrop.lol	Fast & Furious 9	Streaming	713K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
mixdrop.club	Fast & Furious 9	Streaming	3.4m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
uqload.com	Minions 2	Streaming	275.6K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
uqload.io	Minions 2	Streaming	2.5m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
uupbom.com	Cruella	Streaming	2.4m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
upbam.org	Cruella	Streaming	210.5K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy

Total Traffic Per Month: 9.5 million visits

Domain	Content	Platform	Traffic*	Provider	Provider Type
MPA DMCA Subpoena Application ( 2:23-mc-00185 )			*SimilarWeb Traffic Data (Visits per Month) ** Denotes ‘back-end’ domains
futemax.la sathoshinamoto.com**	It Chapter Two	Streaming	5.3m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
futemax.re sinalpublico.com**	Supernatural	Streaming	12.2m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
futemax.ink playertv.net**	Justice League	Streaming	874K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
canales.online	Big Bang Theory	Streaming	5.5m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
uupbom.com	Cruella	Streaming	2.4m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
upbam.org	Cruella	Streaming	210.5K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy

Total Traffic Per Month: 26.5 million visits

Domain	Content	Platform	Traffic*	Provider	Provider Type
MPA DMCA Subpoena Application ( 2:23-mc-00186) MPA DMCA Subpoena Application ( 2:23-mc-00188			*SimilarWeb Traffic Data (Visits per Month) ** Denotes ‘back-end’ domains
iptv-sharing.org ipfr.tv (M3U)**	The Lion King	IPTV	No Data	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
autoembed.to	A Quiet Place	Video Host	24.3K (N/A)	Tonic.to	Registry
animension.to	Spirited Away	Streaming	8.5m	Tonic.to	Registry
adjaranet.to	Frozen II	Streaming	3.7m	Tonic.to	Registry

Total Traffic Per Month: 12.2 million visits (accounted for in other subpoenas)

Domain	Content	Platform	Traffic*	Provider	Provider Type
MPA DMCA Subpoena Application ( 2:23-mc-00187 )			*SimilarWeb Traffic Data (Visits per Month) ** Denotes ‘back-end’ domains
comando.la	The Batman	Torrent/Index	2.1m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
filmesmega.co	The Batman	Index/DDL	1.6m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
filmeviatorrents.org	The Batman	Torrent/Index	692K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
autoembed.to	A Quiet Place	Video Host	24.3K (N/A)	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
bombuj.si	A Quiet Place	Streaming	7.1m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
watchgameofthrones.co	Game of Thrones	Streaming	NoData	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
animefire.vip	Food Wars!	Streaming	6.8m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
gdrivelatino.net	The Batman	Index/Pay	301.8K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
animesonline.in	Tokyo Revengers	Streaming	258.4K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
cuevana-3.id	The Batman	Streaming	6.5m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
compucalitv.org	Elvis	Multi-Content	3.9m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
cinecalidad.com.mx	Encanto	Streaming	5.3m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
redecanais.zip	Encanto	Streaming	22.4m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
megatorrentsx.com.br	Encanto	Torrent/Index	348.9K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
megatorrentsx.com	Encanto	Torrent/Index	#visits	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
limontorrents.com limontorrent.com**	Encanto	Torrent/Index	92.8K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
mmfilmes.me	Encanto	Streaming/Pay	682.3K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
gogoanime2.org	Romantic Killer	Streaming	19.3M	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
9anime2.com	Romantic Killer/small>	Streaming	314.4K	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
animepahe.ru	Batman Ninja	Streaming	21.9m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
animeflix.live	Yasuke	Streaming	6.1m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
bstsrs.one	Big Bang Theory	Streaming	9.6m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
kickassanime.am	JoJo Advent.	Streaming	#visits	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
gozofinder.com	The Batman	Search Engine	9.9m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy
adjaranet.to	Frozen II	Streaming	3.7m	Cloudflare	CDN/Proxy

Total Traffic Per Month: 51.5 million visits

CompucaliTV.org has already informed its users that after a 13-year run online, it has thrown in the towel. According to a report from La Republica , a since-removed message on the homepage read, “This is not a goodbye, but a thank you. We regret to inform that the CompucaliTV site has closed.”

Former users have been saying their goodbyes on social media, with one perfectly encapsulating why the site was great – and why it was under pressure to shut down – in the same sentence .

“I downloaded Disney and Dreamworks movies in 1080p quality and with dual audio for the last 2 years, I’m going to miss this one, guys. RIP.”

On the back of reports that some users can still access the site depending on region, it’s worth noting that at least four Compucalitv look-a-like domains were registered in December, on top of another dozen or so already in existence.

Domain-Hopping, Compliance

This is just one small example of the complications faced by ACE on a daily basis. So-called domain-hopping has escalated to become almost an artform in some parts of the world, with a report from Japan earlier this year noting that some sites operated from Vietnam actually grow their traffic when jumping to new domains. That’s hardly the kind of news coalitions like ACE want to hear.

There are also signs that some platforms contacted by ACE are indicating some level of compliance and then acting in a way that suggests the complete opposite. If that’s indeed the case, history says there will be a price to pay for that at some point; maybe not this year, maybe not next, but it will come.

Eventually, all site operators get tired, sick, start a family, find other things more exciting or simply get bored. When it comes to piracy, the MPA never, ever get bored, and never get tired of setting an example when one is required.

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

In July 2022, popular IPTV service provider SmoothStreams suddenly went offline in somewhat unusual circumstances.

In the weeks that followed, evidence emerged that the Canada-based service had been targeted after Bell Media, Rogers Media, Disney, Paramount, Columbia, and Warner Bros. filed a copyright infringement complaint at Canada’s Federal Court.

On July 14, 2022, after obtaining an injunction and an Anton Piller order, which authorized the plaintiffs to search and seize evidence from premises linked to the defendants, dozens of receivers, encoders, and rows of servers were seized from three locations .

Other aspects of the Anton Piller order, which granted the plaintiffs extraordinary powers and threatened serious consequences for any non-compliant defendant, faced considerable resistance.

Among other things, the alleged operators of SmoothStreams, Marshall Macciacchera and Antonio Macciacchera (son and father respectively), were required to disclose specific technical and financial information about the service’s operations. Marshall failed to fully comply with the order; Antonio simply refused to read it .

From the beginning, Antonio denied any involvement in the SmoothStreams operation, a position he maintains today.

Contempt of Court

While both defendants faced contempt of court proceedings, Antonio’s case progressed more quickly than his co-defendant’s.

An order issued by Associate Judge Benoit Duchesne on July 21, 2022, concerned ten charges pertaining to alleged breaches of the Anton Piller order issued by Justice Rochester on June 28, 2022. Chief Justice Paul S. Crampton subsequently found that Antonio was in contempt of four of the ten charges in that order. The final six all faced issues.

In respect of five charges, Chief Justice Crampton found that while the plaintiffs had previously tendered evidence in the proceeding before Justice Rochester, no evidence was presented in this particular hearing to connect Antonio to any of the technical and financial information listed in Judge Duchesne’s order.

The final charge also failed after no evidence was produced to show that Antonio concealed anything described in Justice Rochester’s interim order.

While logic suggests that four charges must be better than ten, contempt of court can be expensive, especially since this proceeding relates to an amount to be awarded to the plaintiffs, with the Court to impose additional penalties later.

Bell, Rogers, and Hollywood Studios Demand Big Money

As detailed in an order handed down by Chief Justice Crampton on Friday, the plaintiffs demanded an immediate payment of CAD$121,124.74 (US$90,440), comprised of $100,038.55 (US$74,695) in legal fees (100% of those incurred), HST (sales tax) of CAD$8,670 (US$6,473), and disbursements of CAD$12,416.19 (US$9,270).

Antonio’s legal team proposed a much lower amount of CAD$10,000 (US$7,466) in total, arguing that the amount was appropriate in light of the six failed charges and any subsequent amount to be imposed by the Court.

In his order, Chief Justice Crampton notes that Antonio continues to insist he had no role in SmoothStreams. Nevertheless, the plaintiffs and the Court still had to “come to grips with a complex record” and an allegedly illegal business Justice Lafrenière previously described as “highly sophisticated” and “lucrative.”

While agreeing that the plaintiffs’ failure to present evidence amounted to a “misstep” weighing in favor of a reduced award, a pro rata 60% reduction would not be appropriate since persistent refusals to cooperate “completely frustrated” the execution of the order.

“Flagrantly Disobeyed” and “Defied the Court”

“[B]y steadfastly refusing to permit the Independent Supervising Solicitor (ISS) […] to enter his home and execute the Rochester Interim Order, Antonio flagrantly disobeyed that Order and defied the Court.

“He also completely frustrated an important purpose of that Order, which was to prevent the circumvention of the Court’s processes by pre-empting the destruction or removal of evidence, or the shifting of funds beyond the Court’s reach,” Chief Justice Crampton’s order reads.

“In these circumstances, he ought not to be able to indirectly and fully benefit from the fact that his blatant defiance of the Rochester Interim Order entirely prevented [the ISS] from establishing the nexus between Antonio and the six charges.”

After weighing the factors for and against, including that Antonio “deliberately deprived the plaintiffs of the element of surprise,” the Judge found that a 25% reduction would be appropriate.

“The public interest in fostering compliance with court orders provides a strong rationale for the ‘customary practice in contempt cases to impose costs on a solicitor-client basis’. This consideration weighs in favor of awarding the Plaintiffs their full costs, less the adjustments discussed above.”

As per Chief Justice Crampton’s order (in Canadian dollars) handed down on December 15, 2023:

The Defendant Antonio Macciacchera shall pay to the Plaintiffs, forthwith, lump sum costs of $94,906.19, comprising reasonable legal fees of $73,000, plus HST of $6,326.67 on those legal fees, plus reasonable disbursements of $12,416.19.

Conversion: Lump sum US$70,863, legal fees US$54,506, HST US$4,723, disbursements US$12,416

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

For Georgia’s 3.7 million citizens, the European mainland lies just over the Black Sea. For the determined, EU membership is also visible on the western horizon; those who look to the north see little except Russia.

The European Union’s preparations to welcome Georgia into the bloc are both meticulous and extraordinarily complicated. Several dedicated websites detail various aspects of vision and planning , yet barely manage to scratch the surface of the challenges ahead.

These include the monumental task of managing the withdrawal symptoms of a nation almost totally reliant on pirated media for their daily entertainment fix.

Pressure From Both the United States and EU

Among hundreds of other conditions and caveats spanning almost every aspect of life in Georgia, EU membership and a headline piracy rate of 90%+ complement each other like oil and water. Something will have to give and for the United States, that day can’t arrive soon enough.

In a 2019 letter sent from the other side of the Atlantic, the Motion Picture Association politely suggested that Georgia needed to take piracy a little more seriously. Two of the country’s largest pirate sites, Adjaranet.com and iMovies.cc, were called out by name as particularly problematic.

It would take another three years but in August 2022, seemingly out of nowhere, local media began reporting the sudden demise of both sites. With Adjaranet and iMovies simultaneously offline “due to maintenance” the finger of blame quickly pointed towards the European Union.

On August 24, 2022, Georgia’s Communications Commission (ComCom) suggested that warnings from the United States were the driving force behind recent events.

“The Motion Picture Association of America, whose members include Disney, Warner Brothers, Universal Pictures, Sony, Paramount Pictures and Netflix, expressed concerns about Georgian sites hosting pirated movies and warned that failure to eliminate the problem could lead to sanctions against the country, which would include delays or complete cancellation of world premieres of movies and TV shows in Georgia,” ComCom announced.

“The American film studios expressed their hope that the Communications Commission would soon help clear the Georgian online space from pirated movies and TV shows,” the Commission added.

Two Years of Negotiations With Pirates

Whether Hollywood envisioned Georgia’s somewhat unorthodox response to its warnings is unclear. In its August 2022 announcement, ComCom revealed that for more than two years, in the wake of the MPA’s letter, it had been “intensively communicating” with websites offering pirated audiovisual content.

The owners of those sites were given precisely two years to bring content displayed on their platforms “in line with legislation” and when some failed to respond, ComCom says it reminded their hosting providers of their obligations.

After blame fell on the EU and then Hollywood following ComCom’s announcement, another potential culprit entered the frame, one much closer to home. Just a week before the shutdowns, local cinema chain Cavea launched Cavea Plus , Georgia’s first and only legal streaming service. Its initially limited catalog reportedly included content supplied by Warner and HBO.

Streaming Pioneer, Hollywood Partner

The pioneering launch of Cavea Plus was an incredibly brave move in a piracy-saturated market, something acknowledged by Cavea Plus manager Salome Kuprashvili in the weeks leading up to the launch. The “harsh reality” in Georgia, Kuprashvili said, is that piracy accounts for “100% of the market.” With the benefit of hindsight, her follow-on comment takes on new light.

“We cannot solve this problem with our own resources, but we are in active cooperation with international as well as local governmental and non-governmental organizations,” Kuprashvili added.

Three months after the launch of Cavea Plus, the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment welcomed its latest member, the 42nd to date.

“Cavea Plus shares ACE’s deep understanding that piracy poses a direct threat to the media and entertainment industry, and we are pleased to welcome them to our global network,” said Charles Rivkin, Chairman and CEO of the MPA and chairman of ACE.

The announcement also revealed that ACE and Cavea had a “long history” of working together to fight piracy in Georgia. Adjaranet.com and iMovies.cc weren’t mentioned by name but ACE did refer to one in the past tense; “The biggest piracy site drew about 11 million monthly visits,” ACE noted.

Adjaranet.com and iMovies.cc Get Officially Shut Down

In an announcement Wednesday, ACE said that after working closely with Georgia’s Ministry of Finance, the two largest illegal streaming sites in the country have now been shut down.

“Over the past two years, adjaranet.com has amassed 140 million visits. During the same period, imovies.cc has attracted nearly 64 million visits,” ACE revealed.

Jan van Voorn, head of ACE and the MPA’s Global Content Protection Chief, thanked Georgian authorities and acknowledged the assistance of one of its own members.

“ACE appreciates the hard work of the Georgian Ministry of Finance and the Anti-Piracy Center of Georgia in the successful closure of these two criminal operations that undermine jobs and growth throughout the Georgian creative sector. Our partnership with Cavea Plus, a key member of ACE in the Caucasus region, has helped ensure a coordinated approach to protecting copyright.”

More Work Needed to Beat Georgia’s Pirates

Within two days of Adjaranet.com’s claimed shutdown in 2022, a similar site with similar domain had already appeared to take up the slack, at least until Adjaranet.com apparently came back from the dead.

With around 6.7 million visits per month, Adjaranet.to does a fairly convincing impression of Adjaranet.com, as it appeared in the weeks before its initial disappearance last year. Others, including Adjaranet.bet, and several iMovies.cc clones receive less traffic, but even 180k visits per month is significant in a country of less than four million.

The “harsh reality” mentioned by Cavea Plus manager Salome Kuprashvili may have been eased by the double shutdowns of Adjaranet and iMovies but in more general terms, the overall picture in Georgia can only be truly appreciated after viewing the list of most-visited entertainment websites.

Such a list is available from Semrush and it reveals a market almost completely dominated by pirate sites, with only a few notable legal outliers.

That’s not only terrible for development of a domestic market crying out for local movies and TV shows, but also a potentially significant roadblock to EU membership.

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

Another day, another report from the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment announcing the demise of yet another large piracy site, spanning several domains.

On this occasion the main target was WatchWrestling.ai, a site that until recently specialized in wrestling events by leading promotions including WWE, AEW, Impact, ROH and NJPW. These shows are extremely popular and traffic figures cited by ACE back that up, and then some.

“Over the past year, watchwrestling.ai and its associated domains have reached more than 253 million visits. Most of the traffic originated from the United States, the United Kingdom, India, and Canada,” the anti-piracy coalition reports.

ACE/DAZN Tag Team

ACE says that it worked closely with DAZN to take down WatchWrestling. DAZN is already a member of ACE but given the streaming service’s interests in the Impact promotion , it’s possible that specialist knowledge came into play.

ACE said it identified and then confronted the site’s owner in Uttar Pradesh, a state in northern India. This so-called ‘knock-and-talk’ approach has been successfully deployed many times over the past several years and DAZN seems happy with the results here.

“DAZN has invested significant amounts in building a successful business around combat sports, helping fund the development of MMA and boxing, as well as providing the best quality content and service for fans,” says Ed McCarthy, Chief Operating Office of DAZN Group.

“To continue to invest, DAZN has to be able to protect its intellectual property. The enforcement work ACE undertakes, as part of its joint Sports Piracy Task Force initiative, is a critical element of this work.”

A Closer Look at WatchWrestling

As mentioned earlier, WatchWrestling.ai appears to have been the priority target but as an individual domain it can’t account for 253 million annual visits. In July the domain received around 8.7m visits according to SimilarWeb data, but in August appeared to lose considerable traffic, with just 7.8m visits reported.

After losing another two million monthly visits in September, ACE turning up in India obviously had a negative impact. So, for the sake of building up a picture, we’ll assume an average of 9 million visits per month over the last year, giving us a total of 108 million annual visits for the .ai domain. That leaves us with just 145 million visits still to find.

The domain WatchWrestling.in didn’t put up any kind of a fight. Using the same Google Analytics tag as the .ai domain made it extremely easy to find, but with just 289,000 visits in July (roughly 3.5 million pa), 140 million visits still need to be accounted for.

With around 462K visits per month, in theory WatchWrestling.gg provides a welcome five million or so visits per year. Unfortunately historical traffic data is thin, but since the domain has an official redirect to ACE, we’ll count its traffic anyway, before anyone notices.

140 Million Annual Visits….For Someone Else to Find

With ACE sometimes reluctant to provide the full picture for operational and other reasons, digging below the surface for additional information is simply routine. Here we ran into multiple issues.

A domain linked with India is currently redirecting to ACE. It used to be a movie and TV show streaming site but right now its many sub-domain redirections are proving an irritant , and may not even be part of the equation.

And then there are the look-a-likes, clones, and other variants that look like WatchWrestling, many with similar domains, that either carry exactly the same or substantially the same content. It may transpire that some of these are destined to be handed over to ACE, the truth is we just don’t know.

At times like these, the scale of the task ahead for groups like ACE comes fully into perspective. Still, taking 250+ million annual visits out of the market is still a massive achievement.

Not quite on the level of events back in nineteen ninety eight when the undertaker threw mankind off hell in a cell and plummeted sixteen feet through an announcers table, but Rome wasn’t built in a day.

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