The filmmakers alleged that RCN failed to disconnect repeat infringers on its network, making the ISP liable for its subscribers’ copyright infringement.

The lawsuit was one of several filed by the same group of filmmakers against U.S. Internet providers, including Grande Communications, Frontier Communications, and Verizon. These all alleged that the ISPs failed to terminate accounts of repeat infringers, which made the providers secondarily liable for these pirating subscribers.

Stipulation of Dismissal

A few days ago, the RCN case came to an end. In a joint stipulation filed on April 21, the movie companies agreed to dismiss the lawsuit. The dismissal is final, which means that the claims cannot be refiled, while each side covers its own costs and expenses.

“[A]ll parties to this matter […] hereby stipulate that this action is dismissed with prejudice pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 41(a)(1)(A)(ii). Each party will bear its own costs, expenses, and attorneys’ fees,” the filing reads.

The legal paperwork does not reference a settlement agreement, nor is a reason mentioned. However, similar to the record label lawsuits against Verizon and Altice that were dropped last week, the Cox Supreme Court decision likely plays a role.

In all these cases, rightsholders argued that the ISPs’ knowledge of the infringing activity, combined with their failure to act, was sufficient to hold them liable for contributory copyright infringement. However, the new Supreme Court ruling narrowed this standard.

In Cox, the Supreme Court stated that contributory liability requires proof that the provider intended its service to be used for infringement. That intent can only be shown in one of two ways. Either the provider actively induced infringement, or the service is one that is tailored to piracy without substantial non-infringing uses.

Reddit Comments and Site Blocking

The RCN case was a substantial one. The filmmakers secured an early win in 2022 when Judge Georgette Castner denied RCN’s motion to dismiss, allowing the contributory and vicarious infringement claims to proceed. The case later expanded through amended complaints and a parallel lawsuit filed by Screen Media Ventures, which was dismissed in 2024.

To gather further evidence, the filmmakers also requested discovery subpoenas against Reddit at the Northern District of California, to unmask users who had posted piracy-related comments. Those efforts largely failed, with Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler ruling that the Redditors’ First Amendment right to anonymous speech outweighed the filmmakers’ interest in the data.

In addition, the case was notable because the filmmakers sought a site-blocking injunction that would have required RCN to block access to The Pirate Bay, 1337x, YTS, RARBG, and other foreign pirate sites. That request was denied as a standalone cause of action, but it remained available as a potential remedy if the filmmakers won the case.

Further Cox Fallout

With this legal battle being dropped, these site-blocking requests will not be considered. However, the Cox ruling has increased the broader call of rightsholder representatives to implement site-blocking legislation in the United States.

There are currently several site-blocking bills in the works, and it is expected that U.S. Congress will seriously consider passing site-blocking legislation before the end of the current term.

Meanwhile, the Cox ruling continues to ripple through U.S. court dockets, with companies including Google and X Corp also arguing the ruling should benefit their pending cases.

—

A copy of the stipulation of dismissal with prejudice, filed at the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey, is available here (pdf). The dismissal was signed by Judge Edward S. Kiel late last week.

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

Downloading content without permission is copyright infringement. These torrent download statistics are only meant to provide further insight into piracy trends. All data are gathered from public resources.

This week we have one newcomer on the list.

“Project Hail Mary” is the most shared title.

The most torrented movies for the week ending on April 27 are:

Note: We also publish an updating archive of all the list of weekly most torrented movies lists.

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

The companies accused the search giant of running Shopping ads for so-called “Pirate Sellers,” merchants who used Google’s platform to promote infringing copies of their textbooks.

The lawsuit has been narrowed significantly since it was first filed. Last June, Judge Jennifer L. Rochon dismissed the publishers’ vicarious copyright infringement claim and their alleged violations of New York General Business Law.

A trademark infringement claim and the core contributory copyright infringement claim survived. However, Google now argues that last month’s Supreme Court ruling in Cox Communications v. Sony Music Entertainment renders the remaining copyright claim legally viable.

Google: Cox Changes Everything

In a motion for partial judgment, filed at the Southern District of New York last week, Google argues that the publishers’ contributory copyright infringement claim rests entirely on a now-defunct theory.

Previously, some lower courts held that “”knowledge of” plus “material contribution” to infringing activities or others could be sufficient to be held liable for contributory copyright infringement. However, the new Supreme Court ruling narrowed this standard.

In Cox, the Supreme Court stated that contributory liability requires proof that the provider intended its service to be used for infringement. That intent can only be shown in one of two ways. Either the provider actively induced infringement, or the service is one that is tailored to piracy without substantial non-infringing uses.

Dismiss Final Copyright Claim

According to Google, the publishers can’t meet this standard. Therefore, their final copyright infringement claim should be dismissed.

“Plaintiffs do not (and cannot) claim that Google provided a service ‘tailored to’ infringement; the Shopping platform plainly has noninfringing uses. And they do not even use the word ‘induce’ or its variants in the complaint. Nor do they assert that Google intended the Shopping platform to be used for infringement,” Google writes.

“Instead the theory Plaintiffs set forth in their complaint is one of material contribution: that Google can be deemed to have the requisite intent to cause infringement because Google continued to run ads from merchants knowing that those merchants were advertising infringing content. This is precisely the theory that Cox rejected.”

Legal Battle Continues

Whether the court agrees with Google’s arguments has yet to be seen, but the request makes clear how far the impact of the Cox Supreme Court ruling can potentially reach.

That said, even if Google’s motion succeeds, the case is not over. The trademark infringement claim under the Lanham Act survived the previous dismissal order and is not addressed in the current motion. The publishers allege that Google Shopping ads displayed unauthorized images of their trademarked textbook covers, and Judge Rochon found that claim was adequately pleaded.

In a separate filing last week, Google also answered the second amended complaint. Among other things, the company cited fair use and innocent infringement as defenses against the trademark claim.

Google also questions whether the publishers have the right to sue at all. The company argues that the textbooks were created as works-made-for-hire, meaning the universities that employed the authors own the copyrights, not the publishers.

Whether that angle will need to be pursued in detail depends on whether the copyright claim will survive the dismissal request, of course.

—

A copy of Google’s motion for partial judgment on the pleadings, filed April 17 at the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, is available here (pdf). Google’s second amended answer, filed April 14, can be found here (pdf).

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

The site did not store any movies, but it hosted links to approximately 11,000 titles before it was shut down.

The site was purportedly operated by a group of people, including film enthusiast “El Feo,” who is also the creator of La Filmoteca Maldita, a YouTube channel with over 400,000 subscribers dedicated to film analysis and criticism.

El Feo told TorrentFreak that the site focused specifically on films that were out of circulation commercially, discontinued, or otherwise difficult to access through normal channels. As such, the project was recognized for its uniqueness and reportedly used as a teaching resource by several universities across Spain and Latin America.

However, despite their educational value, the films were not necessarily in the public domain, and many were protected by active copyrights. As a result, Zoowoman eventually attracted attention from rightsholders. And while the site specifically asked “creativity vampires” to leave it alone, that didn’t last.

Zoowoman Raid and Prosecution

In 2021, El Feo’s home was raided, with the authorities taking over the Zoowoman WordPress admin account using credentials recovered from his phone. The police locked the admin out of the site and blocked public access to the archive while leaving the hosting account untouched.

The enforcement action eventually led to a lawsuit backed by EGEDA, the Spanish audiovisual rights management headed by Enrique Cerezo, who is a film producer and president of the football club Atlético de Madrid. Through court, EGEDA requested two and a half years in prison and damages of €870,000.

The action against Zoowoman coincided with the launch of FlixOlé, a subscription streaming platform for classic Spanish cinema also backed by Cerezo, which served an overlapping audience.

After several years, the Zoowoman case went to trial earlier this month, where the prosecution presented evidence that the defendant generated approximately €12,000 in streaming income from YouTube, Patreon, and PayPal over four years. While this revenue wasn’t generated from the Zoowoman website, the prosecution argued that the defendant profited from the overall ecosystem.

The prosecution also argued that the film archive facilitated widespread copyright infringement, which also affected EGEDA as a collective rights management outfit.

“El Feo” Fights Back

Speaking with TorrentFreak, El Feo noted that the €12,000 in revenue cited by the prosecution is completely unrelated to the defunct film archive. In fact, the defense argued that he had stepped back from the project in late 2019, roughly two years before his arrest, because his YouTube work had become too demanding.

Nonetheless, the police investigation highlighted him as the sole and main defendant. According to El Feo, the other WordPress admins were reclassified as regular users by the investigators, effectively reducing the case to a single defendant.

“They came in, converted the rest of the admins into users, to focus the investigation on me. Better to have one defendant than 15,” El Feo told us (translated from Spanish), while stressing that he is glad that the other people who were involved in Zoowoman did not get in trouble.

Critically, El Feo also noted that the police failed to preserve the site’s server logs. As a result, there was no record of which administrators were accessing the site or from which IP addresses. According to El Feo, this means that he wasn’t able to mount a proper defense.

El Feo released a video on his case on the La filmoteca maldita YouTube channel earlier this month, after the trial was completed. At the time of writing, however, the verdict has yet to be released.

The verdict is expected to be released soon. The outcome is likely to be watched closely by digital preservation communities across Spain and Latin America, where Zoowoman built a dedicated following among cinephiles and academics.

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

Many of the same record labels that fought Cox, also have active cases against other ISPs. This includes high-profile cases against Verizon and Altice.

These cases were already paused last year, awaiting the Supreme Court decision. This week, it became clear that both sides have agreed to dismiss the cases. In both cases, the parties filed joint stipulations voluntarily dismissing the lawsuits.

According to the legal paperwork, the dismissals are with prejudice, meaning the claims cannot be refiled. In addition, all parties will pay their own costs and expenses.

“[All parties] hereby jointly stipulate to dismissal of all claims in this matter with prejudice under Fed. R. Civ. P. Rule 41(a)(1)(A)(ii), with each side bearing its own costs, expenses, and attorneys’ fees,” the filings read.

Billions of Dollars at Stake

The Verizon case, filed in July 2024, is particularly noteworthy as the record labels requested more than $2.6 billion in damages in that case alone.

In that lawsuit, UMG, Warner Music, Sony Music, and ABKCO, accused Verizon of burying its head in the sand by ignoring hundreds of thousands of copyright infringement notices. This includes more than 500 subscribers for whom the ISP received more than 100 notices each.

The Altice lawsuit was filed in December 2023 by Warner Records, Sony Music Entertainment, and dozens of affiliated labels and publishers. The complaint also accused the ISP of not doing enough to stop piracy, with potential damages exceeding $1.6 billion.

In both cases, the music companies argued that the ISPs’ knowledge of the infringing activity, combined with their failure to act, was sufficient to be held liable for contributory copyright infringement. However, the new Supreme Court ruling narrowed this standard.

In Cox, the Supreme Court stated that contributory liability requires proof that the provider intended its service to be used for infringement. That intent can only be shown in one of two ways. Either the provider actively induced infringement, or the service is one that is tailored to piracy without substantial non-infringing uses.

The Cox Fallout Spreads

The Altice and Verizon dismissals are the most concrete sign yet that the labels see the post-Cox landscape as unfavorable terrain for this type of lawsuit. They are not the only fallout, however.

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court also vacated the Fifth Circuit’s $46.7 million verdict against Grande Communications, sending the case back for reconsideration in light of Cox.

Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s X Corp. cited the Cox decision within days of its release in its bid to dismiss the music publishers’ “weaponized DMCA” lawsuit.

Interestingly, however, not all ISP lawsuits appear to be ready for dismissal yet. The record labels still have an active case against Internet provider RCN in New Jersey. In that case, RCN recently informed the court of the impact of the Cox ruling, but there is no mention of a potential dismissal in that docket yet.

—

A copy of the Joint Stipulation of Dismissal filed by the labels and Altice in Texas federal court is available here (pdf). The joint stipulation filed by the labels and Verizon in New York federal court is available here (pdf).

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

While the original iterations of these sites were shut down or “retired” years ago, their names remain immensely popular with users.

The pirate streaming sites continue to draw in millions of monthly visitors without much hassle. However, that changed this week when dozens of domains suddenly became unreachable, all pointing to a Cloudflare 521 error.

The error indicates that the origin web server refuses the connection. This does not mean that Cloudflare intervened. Instead, it suggests that the backend server, which hosts the website, has stopped responding.

None of the affected sites have offered an explanation, nor has any anti-piracy organization claimed credit for a takedown. However, it is clear that these sites were seen as a major threat.

The Motion Picture Association (MPA), for example, identified the Myflixerz and Sflix networks as a priority threat in its notorious markets submission to the U.S. Trade Representative last fall. This piracy ring alone was good for 622 million visits in August 2025, MPA reported.

Those domains, including sflix.to, sflix2.to, moviesjoytv.to, myflixerz.to, and hdtodayz.to, are now among those returning 521 errors.

A Shared Backend

Why would so many sites go down simultaneously? They are not necessarily all operated by the same people. However, there is likely a common denominator, which was also cited by the MPA’s report.

Many of the affected sites rely on a shared backend infrastructure, which anti-piracy groups have dubbed “Piracy-as-a-Service” (PaaS). Instead of hosting video files themselves, the front-end piracy sites use services such as MegaCloud and VidCloud that actually serve the streams. And more recently, these PaaS services have also offered website hosting.

The MPA described exactly this setup in its notorious markets recommendation, specifically referring to the Sflix and Myflixerz network:

“These sites rely on their own PaaS infrastructure (formerly known as 2embed[.]to, which ACE took down in June 2023) and despite enforcement, they continue to thrive through alternative domains and backend hosting on platforms such as MegaCloud, VidCloud, and RapidCloud. Unlike the previous CMS model, which explicitly enabled pirate sites to embed movies and monetize streams, this new model functions as a backend hosting network powering popular pirate domains such as those mentioned above. These services act as a media source server, serving video files directly allowing a myriad of sites to provide streams to users.”

If many sites indeed rely on the same backend hosting network, similar Cloudflare errors would appear across all dependent sites if it goes offline. This would explain what we’re seeing today.

If the backend PaaS infrastructure has indeed been targeted, it would represent one of the most significant blows to the streaming piracy landscape since the original 2embed takedown in 2023.

For now, the cause of this massive outage remains unconfirmed. Whether the affected domain names will make their way back online or if the 521 error is the final curtain call has yet to be seen. However, the “zombie” brands will likely reappear in some shape or form.

—

– myflixerz.to
– sflix.to
– moviesjoytv.to
– flixhq.to
– hdtoday.cc
– hdtoday.tv
– watchseries.pe
– watch32.sx
– myflixtor.tv
– theflixertv.to
– zoechip.cc
– fmovie.ws
– 9animetv.to
– hdtodayz.to
– fboxtv.com
– freehdmovies.to
– freemoviesfull.com
– actvid.rs
– dopebox.to

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

The Paramount Pictures production was not scheduled to come out before October, but that changed when copies of the film began spreading online.

The trouble started on April 12 when X user @ImStillDissin posted two clips from the film, misleadingly claiming that someone at Nickelodeon had “accidentally emailed me the entire Avatar Aang movie.” Both clips were taken down via DMCA notices shortly after.

The initial leaker later told the Hollywood Reporter that he actually received the film through a contact from his “hacker days.” He didn’t realize what it was until he looked it up, and decided to post the snippets online.

The clips carried a #PeggleCrew watermark, a nod to the hacking group that is allegedly behind the breach, although this remains unconfirmed.

Not long after the clips were removed, a second X user posted the full film, racking up over a million views before that too was removed. Paramount, meanwhile, remained quiet and did not issue a public statement on the leak.

Behind the scenes, however, the movie studio and its anti-piracy partners have been quite busy. Initially, they mostly dealt with copies of the film being reposted on X by different users, but their challenge was spreading elsewhere too.

DMCA Notice Whac-a-Mole

After the leak was public, the film started to spread through other platforms too. Records in the Lumen Database show that Paramount and its enforcement teams at MarkScan Digital, Marketly LLC, and Vobile Inc. all sprung into action, flagging various leaked copies.

This includes DMCA takedown requests directly targeting leaks on third-party services such as Google Drive and the video service Vimeo, both of which were swiftly taken down.

However, some takedown requests include more indirect links too. For example, a DMCA notice sent on behalf of Paramount by MarkScan on April 13, targets a 4chan discussion thread, which typically only remains online briefly. This notice also listed a file that was posted on Rootz.

While Paramount clearly tried hard to contain the leak, it appeared that the problem only became harder to enforce.

The Piracy Ecosystem Takes Over

Unlike most movie leaks, the Avatar: Aang leak did not originate from a scene or P2P group. However, it found its way into the traditional piracy ecosystem within hours, where it continues to thrive today.

Multiple copies were uploaded to torrent sites and are widely shared, making it the second most pirated movie of the past week. This includes a copy that was uploaded to The Pirate Bay by “TheRedPill,” who referenced the ongoing whac-a-mole at other platforms in the upload description.

“Found this copy on twitter of all places via a wetranfer link. Supposedly this is a webrip that was sent to someone who then leaked it online. it has been passed around all day with links going up and down,” the uploader wrote.

This wasn’t the only copy of the leak that surfaced on torrent sites, as many others appeared around the same time. Meanwhile, pirate streaming sites began indexing the leak as well, further expanding its audience by millions of people.

As shown above, torrent site 1337x currently hosts a wide variety of leaked copies. These all originate from the same source but are reported in different qualities.

Little Recourse Beyond Google

Dozens of notices posted in the Lumen database show that Paramount and its enforcement partners are also targeting these pirate sites. However, since most of these sites don’t respond to takedown notices, these sites present a persistent problem.

For these pirate sites, Paramount typically asks Google to delist the URLs from search results, which reduces discoverability but does not take the infringing content offline.

The notice below, for example, was sent to Google yesterday and targets various torrent and streaming sites. However, that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Also, it’s worth stressing that the notices in the Lumen Database reported here are only the fraction of Paramount’s takedown efforts that’s public. Most of their efforts, including any notices sent directly to X or other platforms that do not report to Lumen, remain unknown.

In addition to taking down content, Paramount will also be interested in finding the source of the leak. According to Variety, unnamed sources said that the matter is under investigation, but the leak reportedly did not originate from within the studio.

For now, Avatar: Aang, The Last Airbender remains on course for its October 9 premiere on Paramount+. By then, most of its target audience has already had the opportunity to watch an early, perhaps unfinished, version of the film for free.

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

Indian courts have issued pirate site blocking orders for over a decade. Initially, these orders were relatively basic, requiring local Internet providers to block specific domain names.

These regular injunctions were only partially effective. After the High Court granted a blocking injunction, pirate sites would often switch to new domains, requiring rightsholders to return to court to get these blocked as well.

Expanding Site Blocking Injunctions

To deal with this problem, the dynamic injunction was invented. These orders were issued to block pirate sites more effectively. ISPs were not only required to block original domains but also any clones and mirror sites that surfaced after the case was finalized.

When dynamic injunctions were no longer sufficient to slay the piracy hydra, rightsholders suggested upgrading the Indian blocking regime with Dynamic++ injunctions. These orders also protect copyrighted content that has yet to be registered.

In addition, Dynamic++ orders and their ‘superlative‘ variant also include domain name registrars as defendants. This includes blocking orders targeted at U.S. domain registrars, much to the delight of U.S. rightsholders.

Delhi High Court Slams the Brakes

The expanding scope of these orders has not gone unquestioned. In a recent ruling in a trademark case, the Delhi High Court has put a hard limit on the addition of new domain names, creating a strong divergence with earlier dynamic site blocking orders that were previously issued by the same High Court.

The case itself started as a routine trademark dispute. Mahindra and Mahindra, one of India’s largest conglomerates, sued a string of packers and movers businesses operating under domain names that incorporated the “MAHINDRA” mark.

The court ordered GoDaddy and other registrars to block five infringing domains, directed India’s telecoms regulator to instruct ISPs to do the same, and required Google to delist the relevant results. All parties complied with this order.

When the case reached its conclusion earlier this year, Mahindra requested to make the order future-proof. The company asked the court to allow a court official to add newly discovered mirror and redirect domains to the blocking order on an ongoing basis, without the need to return to a judge each time.

To back up this request, Mahindra pointed to two Delhi High Court rulings that implemented the same procedure: a 2019 decision against 1337x, The Pirate Bay, and others, and a 2023 ruling targeting cyberlocker sites including Mixdrop.

The same procedure had been used routinely in piracy cases ever since, so the company did not expect much pushback. However, after reviewing the matter, Justice Tushar Rao Gedela said no.

Case Closed

The reason for the denial comes down to a straightforward point about how courts work. Once a judge signs a final ruling and closes a case, the court’s authority over that matter ends. It can still fix typos and calculation errors, but it cannot reopen proceedings to add new defendants or extend the reach of its orders.

That principle applies directly here. Once the case was closed, the blocking order against the original five domains became part of the final judgment.

Additionally, Justice Gedela said that it is “beyond comprehension” that a court officer could add new parties and extend dynamic injunctions, even when the judge no longer has the power to do so.

According to Tejaswini Kaushal, analyst at the Indian intellectual property publication SpicyIP, rightsholders can still request injunctions under the new ruling. However, they will have to file a new proceeding to block additional domains after a case is closed.

“This means that practitioners will now have to rely on execution proceedings or initiate fresh litigation to address new instances of infringement,” Kaushal writes.

The ruling effectively creates a divergence between judges of the same court. A rights holder appearing before a different Delhi HC judge could receive the opposite answer today. The question will remain unsettled until a higher bench resolves it.

Legislature, Step In

Justice Gedela did not leave the matter there. The judgment calls on India’s Parliament to update is civil procedure rules and regulations governing online intermediaries, to create a proper legal basis for post-judgment blocking orders.

“There is an urgent and alarming need for the Central Government and the Legislature to act in haste to bring about radical changes,” the judgment states, noting that rightsholders should not be powerless against new infringers who simply weren’t part of the original proceedings.

The ruling effectively means that infringing domains names that appear after a case closes will now require fresh legal action, at least until a higher court settles the question.

This significantly changes the game for film studios, Netflix, and sports rightsholders who repeatedly relied on post-judgment expansions. They can still get these additional blockades by going back to court, but that means more time, and more money, to achieve the same result.

For now, the ball is in Parliament’s court.

—-

A copy of the judgment in Mahindra and Mahindra Limited & Anr. v. Diksha Sharma Proprietor of Mahindra Packers Movers & Ors. (CS(COMM) 209/2023) is available here.

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

Like other platforms that host user-generated content, this massive code library occasionally runs into copyright infringement issues too.

As an intermediary, GitHub allows rightsholders to submit DMCA takedown notices to get infringing content removed. In addition, it also accepts DMCA anti-circumvention notices, requesting the removal of projects that bypass copy controls and restrictions.

The best-documented anti-circumvention claim on GitHub was sent by the RIAA back in 2020. At the time, the music industry group requested the removal of the open-source youtube-dl project, which is used by YouTube ripper software.

After initially removing the repository, GitHub later decided to reinstate the project, arguing that it doesn’t violate the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provisions. This decision still holds today, as the project remains on GitHub, despite having its website taken down by similar complaints.

Circumvention Claims Increased 41%

When the RIAA sent its anti-circumvention notices, these were still rare. In that year, GitHub only received 63 of these per year. That has increased more than tenfold since.

GitHub’s full-year transparency report that was just released reveals that it received 645 circumvention claims in 2025. That’s up 41% from a year earlier, and the bar chart shared by GitHub shows that these removal requests are clearly in an upward trend.

The initial boost in reports came in 2022, after GitHub updated its DMCA takedown submission form with questions explicitly related to circumvention. Providing that option triggered many more submitters to tick that box, raising the number of ‘circumvention’ claims.

Processing circumvention notices is quite costly for the company, as they are carefully reviewed by legal experts and engineers, to ensure that developers’ projects are not taken down without valid reasons.

“In cases where we are unable to determine whether a claim is valid, we will err on the side of the developer, and leave the content up,” GitHub writes in its policy, also pointing out that it has a million-dollar Developer Defense Fund for those who need it.

Surge in DMCA removals

The transparency report also covers ordinary takedown notices, which are much more common. In 2025, GitHub processed 2,661 takedown notices in 2025, which affected 47,228 repositories.

The number of targeted repositories surged 51.6% compared to 2024, while the number of notices also went up by roughly a third.

As shown above, August and November accounted for nearly half the year’s total, with 12,030 and 11,357 repositories taken down respectively. That pattern strongly suggests a small number of bulk complaints against projects with many forks, rather than a broad industry-wide surge.

GitHub Applauds Landmark DMCA Liability Ruling

The latest transparency report was announced in a blog post this week, where GitHub also referenced the Supreme Court ruling in Cox v. Sony. Which also affects its platform.

Previously, copyright holders had successfully pushed expansive theories of secondary liability, arguing that platforms could be held contributorily liable for user infringement even without direct involvement. That made intermediaries less likely to defend or protect users. The Supreme Court decision changed this.

“The Court’s opinion reinforced that service providers are not automatically liable for copyright infringement by users without evidence of intent to encourage or materially contribute to infringement,” GitHub’s Margaret Tucker noted.

This echoes comments it made earlier, where GitHub characterized the ruling as a key victory.

“This is a landmark victory for the open internet and for every developer who depends on platforms like GitHub to build, share, and collaborate on code. GitHub will always stand up for developers and for keeping the internet open,” GitHub wrote.

This doesn’t mean that GitHub will fundamentally change its DMCA policy, of course; this just gives them more room to side with developers, when appropriate.

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

Through multiple domains, it offered access to manga and manhwa comics free of charge, attracting many millions of visitors.

In 2024, a detailed report from Deepsee flagged Zonatmo.com as a particularly popular domain. Together with the other TMO properties, it was estimated to generate a billion views in November that year.

The same research linked the TMO operation to the Spanish company Nakamas Web SL, which was reportedly responsible for the sites.

This level of openness is unusual for a pirate site. DeepSee.io CEO Rocky Moss projected that the site would be stopped before the end of 2025. That projection was off by a few months, as TMO went offline in early 2026.

TMO’s website started having problems around March 18. This was widely noticed on social media, including a post by Animetrends that has been viewed close to 2.5 million times.

Without an official explanation from the site’s operators, many fans kept hope that it would make a comeback. A notice on the site suggesting it was “under maintenance” added to that impression.

However, after a few days that hope faded, as the main ZonaTMO domain was put on clienthold. This suspension status is typically set by a domain registrar in response to a legal complaint, and effectively renders the domain inaccessible.

The WHOIS data for zonatmo.com also clearly lists Nakamas Web as the company behind the site.

While TMO’s future was looking more and more troubled, the operators remained silent. Information received by TorrentFreak suggested that Korean webtoon platforms were involved, helped by serious anti-piracy forces. That information was officially confirmed today.

Spanish Takedown Following Cross-Border Investigation

The Copyright Overseas Promotion Association (COA), which represents many Korean publishers, including Kakao and Webtoon, announced that it conducted a multi-month investigation into the piracy operation.

COA worked with the commercial anti-piracy outfit IP-House and Spanish law firm Santiago Mediano Abogados, who eventually shared their gathered evidence with the local authorities for follow-up action.

This operation eventually led to an enforcement effort in Almeria, Spain, which resulted in the takedown of a network of interconnected websites, including Visortmo and TuMangaOnline.

—

Update April 22: The Spanish authorities officially confirmed the action.

—

While it is now confirmed that Korean rightsholders are behind the Spanish shutdown, not many details are shared. There is no mention of any arrests, for example, and no suspects have been identified either.

The involvement of the company Nakamas Web remains unconfirmed as well, although it’s worth noting that this company is based in Almeria, which was the center of the police operation. A request for comment to the company, whose website is still online, remains unanswered.

Pending Law Enforcement Investigation

Speaking with TorrentFreak, COA confirms that its members had their eyes set on TMO for a long time. While the group confirms the takedown, it can’t share further information at this point as the law enforcement investigation is ongoing.

“Zonatmo (TuMangaOnline, TMO) has long been recognized as a major illegal platform known for distributing unauthorized translations of Korean content in Spanish. Korean rightsholders had been monitoring the platform since its earlier stages, and in response, have pursued concrete legal enforcement actions overseas through COA.”

“At present, several matters remain at the stage of investigation in cooperation with local law enforcement authorities. As such, we are not in a position to disclose specific additional targets at this time,” a COA spokesperson adds.

For details, COA referred us to IP-House, which we asked about the suspects that were identified, whether any arrests were made, or whether a deal was reached with the operator of TMO. However, IP House declined to answer, citing an active investigation.

IP-House CEO Jan van Voorn commented on the action in broad terms in a press statement.

“This outcome reflects the strength of cross-border collaboration in addressing complex digital piracy to protect creators, consumers, and the integrity of the global content ecosystem,” Van Voorn said.

“We are proud to have supported COA in advancing this investigation and commend the Spanish National Police for their leadership and effectiveness in executing this enforcement action,” he added.

Part of a Wider Wave

The TMO takedown coincided with one of the most active periods of manga and anime piracy enforcement in history. In March 2026, HiAnime also went offline. The reason for HiAnime’s closure has not been officially confirmed, though it followed sustained pressure from the anti-piracy alliance ACE and a recent callout by the USTR.

Earlier, in January 2026, the manga aggregator Bato.to was shut down following action by Japanese anti-piracy body CODA and pressure from the Korean company Kakao Entertainment, with its operator identified and subject to criminal investigation in China.

According to COA, the TMO takedown is not the last enforcement action that’s planned on their end.

“This action forms part of a broader enforcement initiative led by COA, representing the K-content alliance” COA told TorrentFreak, adding that it “is actively investigating operators of such platforms and preparing coordinated legal actions across multiple jurisdictions.”

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

This is also the case in Chile, where there’s no shortage of options. This includes brands such as MagisTV, FlujoTV, and, XuperTV, which are popular throughout many countries in the region.

These services are a thorn in the side of rightsholders, including the American Hollywood giant Warner Bros. Entertainment, which filed a formal complaint. This effort paid off in February, when Chile’s Department of Telecommunications issued a dynamic blocking order, requiring ISPs to block domains linked to these pirate brands.

Warner Bros. Raises the Stakes

While the blocking action sorted some effect, the IPTV problem remained. This prompted Warner Bros. to raise the stakes by filing a criminal complaint against a company named Streaming Chile SpA that allegedly sells copyright-infringing IPTV subscriptions.

Chilean newspaper La Tercera reports that Warner Bros. accuses the company and its representatives, the 56-year-old Marta Leyton and her son Joaquín Ávila (25) of copyright infringement and computer fraud.

The complaint mentions that IPTV services are widely adopted. While some of these streaming services operate legally, many operate without permission of rightsholders.

“Alongside the growth of a legal IPTV service industry, an illegal industry of unauthorized IPTV service providers has grown alarmingly. These providers offer their clients pay television services via the internet, providing them with access to various content (channels),” the complaint alleges.

Warner Bros. is represented by attorney Daniel Steinmetz, who noted that illegal IPTV services often rebroadcast legal streams without permission from rightsholder, bypassing copyright protections.

Several Linked IPTV Services

TorrentFreak has not seen a copy of the complaint, and the available reporting does not identify any associated URLs. However, the website streaming-chile.net notes in the its footer that it is owned by Streaming Chile SpA, which fits the picture.

The website in question mentions that the operation serves more than 35,000 customers worldwide. The same company, which also offers reseller services, is linked to other streaming platforms such as mejoriptv.net, maxtv.cl, and plandetv.cl.

As seen above, these IPTV services are also mentioned in the “our customers say” section on the main website. The Trustpilot page has less favorable reviews.

Part of a Broader Crackdown

Warner Bros. referral is part of a broader regional push against IPTV piracy. In February, for example, an Argentine court expanded the crackdown on pirate IPTV services by blocking more than 70 domains while ordering Google to disable sideloaded Android apps.

In Chile, the criminal referral against Streaming Chile SpA stands out because it targets a company and its representative by name, under criminal law rather than a civil procedure.

The Warner Bros. complaint is also the first known Chilean case to invoke the Ley de Delitos Económicos (Economic Crimes Law). Enacted in 2023, the law allows courts to order confiscation of all profits derived from criminal conduct. In addition, it imposes fines that scale with the defendant’s income, well beyond the penalties available under standard copyright law alone.

For now, the criminal complaint is at an early investigative stage. No arrests have been reported, and, as far as we can see, the IPTV services that we could link to the company remain online.

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

However, last December, the site announced that it had also backed up Spotify, which came as a shock to the music industry.

Anna’s Archive initially released only Spotify metadata, and no actual music, but that put the music industry on high alert. Together with the likes of Universal, Warner, and Sony, Spotify filed a lawsuit days later, hoping to shut the site down.

Through a preliminary injunction targeting domain registrars and registries, the shadow library lost several domain names. However, not all were taken down, and the site registered various new domain names as backups.

The legal pressure also appeared to pay off in other ways. Not long after the lawsuit was filed, the shadow library removed the Spotify listing for their torrents page. The same applies to the first batch of music files that was accidentally released in February.

The site’s operator, Anna’s Archivist, hoped that these removals would motivate the music industry to back down, but that wasn’t the case. Instead, they returned to court requesting a $322 million default judgment after the defendant failed to show up in court.

$322 Million, Granted in Full

Yesterday, Judge Jed Rakoff of the Southern District of New York entered a default judgment against the site’s unknown operators, awarding Spotify and the major labels the requested $322 million damages award in full.

The music labels get the statutory maximum of $150,000 in damages for around 50 works. Spotify adds a DMCA circumvention claim of $2,500 for 120,000 music files, bringing the total to more than $322 million.

The plaintiff previously described their damages request as “extremely conservative.” The DMCA claim is based only on the 120,000 files, not the full 2.8 million that were released. Had they applied the $2,500 rate to all released files, the damages figure would exceed $7 billion.

Anna’s Archive did not show up in court, and the operators of the site remain unidentified. The judgment attempts to address this directly, by ordering Anna’s Archive to file a compliance report within ten business days, under penalty of perjury, that includes valid contact information for the site and its managing agents.

Whether the site will comply with this order is highly uncertain.

For now, the monetary judgment is mostly a victory on paper, as recouping money from an unknown entity is impossible. For this reason, the music companies also requested a permanent injunction.

Permanent Injunction Targets Domains

In addition to the damages award, Rakoff entered a permanent worldwide injunction covering ten Anna’s Archive domains: annas-archive.org, .li, .se, .in, .pm, .gl, .ch, .pk, .gd, and .vg.

Domain registries and registrars of record, along with hosting and internet service providers, are ordered to permanently disable access to those domains, disable authoritative nameservers, cease hosting services, and preserve evidence that could identify the site’s operators.

The judgment names specific third parties bound by those obligations, including Public Interest Registry, Cloudflare, Switch Foundation, The Swedish Internet Foundation, Njalla SRL, IQWeb FZ-LLC, Immaterialism Ltd., Hosting Concepts B.V., Tucows Domains Inc., and OwnRegistrar, Inc.

Anna’s Archive is also ordered to destroy all copies of works scraped from Spotify and to file a compliance report within ten business days, under penalty of perjury, including valid contact information for the site and its managing agents. That last requirement could prove significant, given that the identity of the site’s operators remains unknown.

A Way Out, at a Price

In theory, Anna’s Archive has the option to prevent the domain suspension. The permanent injunction allows the site to seek relief from this measure, after showing that it has paid the full $322 million damages award and complied with all injunctive obligations.

That’s an unlikely option, to say the least. At the same time, however, it is not guaranteed that the site’s domain names will be suspended.

As reported previously, several domain names, including the Greenland-based .gl version, are linked to registries and registrars outside the jurisdiction of the U.S. court. As such, they previously did not comply to the preliminary injunction, and it is unknown whether the latest order changes that.

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A copy of the default judgment entered by Judge Rakoff is available here (pdf).

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

These blocking actions initially relied on measures that required Internet providers to restrict access to notorious pirate sites. More recently, however, blocking requirements have spread to other online intermediaries.

For example, in several countries, blocking injunctions expanded to third-party DNS resolvers such as Cloudflare, OpenDNS and Google. Not much later, VPN services became a target, as these could also be used to circumvent blocking orders.

While major rightsholders argue these measures are effective and proportionate, critics highlighted overblocking incidents where anti-piracy measures restricted access to legitimate sites and services, restricting the free flow of information.

A new report published by the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) today adds substantial weight to that critique. CEPS is not part of the EU, but it operates as a leading independent think tank that advises on EU policy.

Benefits and Costs of Website-Blocking Legislation

The study, titled The Benefits and Costs of Website-Blocking Legislation: An Economic, Legal and Policy Assessment, examines website-blocking measures across all 27 EU Member States and assesses whether those measures are effective, proportionate, and compatible with EU law.

The report’s central finding is blunt. It concludes that site blocking is associated with substantial risk of unintended consequences and harmful side effects. These adverse effects, including overblocking, are not always fully recognized before site-blocking measures are enacted.

The report suggests that blocking schemes are prone to overblocking because these rightsholders are not liable for mistakes, nor do they bear the costs, which are typically paid by the ISPs or other intermediaries.

“These problems are exacerbated by the fact that rightsholders bear none of the costs of website blocking and are thus incentivised to pursue stringent blocking orders without concern for the collateral damage they cause – there is no back-pressure,” the report reads.

Italy and Spain: A Pattern of Collateral Damage

The report examines six EU jurisdictions in detail, and in each case, the findings are critical of site blocking.

Italy’s Piracy Shield, operated by regulator AGCOM, requires ISPs to block notified domains and IP addresses within 30 minutes, with no prior court order. This system has repeatedly resulted in overblocking, where the anti-piracy system blocked access to legitimate sites and services.

Instead of addressing the collateral damage concerns, AGCOM fined Cloudflare €14.2 million in January, after the company refused to globally filter its 1.1.1.1 DNS resolver. Cloudflare has since appealed the fine, while challenging the legitimacy of the Piracy Shield system.

Spain has also seen reports of similar collateral damage through its blocking regime. For example, the report notes that when LaLiga was granted a court order in its favor, it targeted a series of Cloudflare-owned IP addresses starting in February 2025. These blocked pirate streams, but also 3,300 lawful services that used the same infrastructure.

“The collateral damage was significant for ordinary users, businesses, and services that had no connection whatsoever to piracy,” the report notes, adding that the court formally dismissed Cloudflare’s appeal in March 2025.

Meanwhile, in Belgium, site-blocking orders have targeted DNS resolvers, which led to OpenDNS temporarily exiting the country in April 2025. The company eventually returned as the ruling was suspended pending appeal, but by then it had already done its damage.

“The episode illustrates how overreaching court orders can have unintended consequences for the broader digital ecosystem, and how disproportionate liability exposure can sometimes incentivise service provider withdrawal rather than compliance,” the report writes.

Report Questions Blocking Effectiveness

Beyond the collateral damage, the report also questions whether blocking achieves its stated objective of stopping piracy. After all, users are typically good at bypassing blocking measures.

The report cites various academic studies, including a 2023 paper published by researchers from Chapman University and Carnegie Mellon University, which found that site blocking led to a modest increase in visits to legal sites. According to the report, it’s unclear if these effects last.

“Recent research confirms that blocking can sharply reduce access to targeted IPTV and streaming piracy services, but no study in the past five years provides a rigorous estimate of how long these effects persist,” the report reads.

The report does find that illegal consumption of films and music has declined substantially over time. However, it attributes this to increasing availability and affordability of legal content, not to enforcement.

Rightsholders are well aware of the limits of site blocking. In response, they expanded their blocking requests to also cover DNS resolvers and VPN providers, as we have seen in France, Belgium, Italy, Spain, and elsewhere.

The CEPS report does not see stricter blocking measures as a solution; it suggests a wide range of other recommendations for the EU, member states, and copyright holders.

IP Blocking Should Be Abolished

The report makes 12 formal recommendations. The most significant is that IP-based blocking should be avoided altogether, due to its inherent tendency to block large numbers of legitimate service sites. DNS-level or URL-level blocking should be used instead.

CEPS points out that this conclusion was also reached following reviews conducted by local telecoms regulator TKK, which effectively banned IP-address blocking in the country.

“To the extent that blocking is used at all, better targeted mechanisms such as DNS-level or URL-level blocking should be used instead, consistent with the Austrian TKK’s reasoning. IP-based blocking is inherently overinclusive because shared IP addresses serve thousands or millions of legitimate domains,” the report reads.

Other recommendations include a requirement for rightsholders to contribute to the costs of implementing blocking measures, and the option to be held liable for damages caused by overblocking at their request.

The report also calls for all blocking orders to be subject to prior or rapid judicial review, to be time-limited with periodic reviews, and narrow in scope.

According to the report, the UK blocking model comes closest to its ideal. English High Court orders are time-limited, technically evidenced, and require rightsholders to demonstrate that proposed blocking methods will not affect legitimate content. There hasn’t been any significant overblocking reported in the UK either.

Nord Security Funded the Study

CEPS writes that the study was conducted at the request of and with the support of Nord Security, parent company of NordVPN. However, the think tank states that the analysis and conclusions are entirely independent and reflect the views of the authors alone.

Speaking with TorrentFreak, a Nord Security spokesperson confirmed its support of the study while stressing that the research was conducted independently.

“Website-blocking measures are expanding across Europe, yet there has been limited independent analysis of whether they are effective, proportionate, and compatible with EU law. Nord Security funded this CEPS study because we believe policy in this area should be shaped by evidence, not assumptions,” Nord told us.

As one of the world’s most widely used VPN services, NordVPN has a major stake in the blocking debate. The company has been targeted by blocking orders, including in France, where it appealed alongside other VPN services.

Nord Security also attended the report’s presentation in Brussels this afternoon, where its Regulatory Policy & Compliance Counsel Emilija Beržanskaitė was critical about site-blocking efforts. At the same hearing, the EU’s Intellectual Property Office and the EU’s Directorate-General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology were also present.

For now, the report arrives at a moment when intermediaries are pushing back against blocking regimes across Europe, while the European Commission is yet to issue harmonized guidance on how member states should address blocking concerns.

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

The initial order required Cloudflare, Google, and Cisco to actively block access to pirate sites through their own DNS resolvers, confirming that third-party intermediaries can be required to take responsibility. Not much later, VPN providers were added to the blocking roster.

Initially, these orders were to address circumvention techniques for domains that were already blocked through ISPs. The DNS resolver and VPN provider blockades limited these loopholes. Several blocking orders have followed since, but a series of orders that came out at the Paris Judicial Court take a different approach.

On March 18, Judge Jean-Christophe Gayet issued seven simultaneous rulings, targeting a broad range of online intermediaries that enable access to pirate sports streams in France. The cases were filed by the Spanish professional football league LaLiga, which requested blocking measures against 35 domain names of sports streaming sites.

The pirate sites listed include librefutboltv.su, which has over 27 million monthly visits, as well as smaller ones such as tflix.live, daddylive.dad, yallashooot.video, ballcontrol.click, and kora-live.im.

The targeted intermediaries span every layer of the technical stack: this includes major French ISPs, alternative DNS resolvers such as Google, Cloudflare, and Quad9, as well as several of the world’s largest VPN providers.

Court: LaLiga Lacks Standing

Interestingly, however, LaLiga was not victorious in court. In each of the seven cases, the court declared the league’s claims inadmissible.

The court explained that, under Article L. 333-10 of the French Sports Code, the right to bring blocking injunctions applies to rightsholders, broadcasting companies, and professional sports leagues. However, the court interprets that last category narrowly.

To qualify for protection, sports leagues must be created by a state-delegated federation under French law, specifically under Articles L. 131-14 and L. 132-1 of the Sports Code. As a Spanish association with no delegation from the French state, LaLiga does not meet that definition.

LaLiga argued that the law should also cover foreign leagues that commercialize their audiovisual rights, and that reading it otherwise would discriminate against non-French rights holders. However, the court rejected these arguments.

The restriction has nothing to do with LaLiga’s nationality, the court noted; the league simply needs a subdelegation from the French state to qualify for protection via site-blocking orders. Additionally, the court concluded that LaLiga is not directly harmed by piracy in France, as it assigned its exclusive French broadcast rights to beIN Sports France.

This same reasoning applied to all seven cases and initially appears to be a major setback for the football league. However, help was just around the corner.

beIN Sports Steps In

beIN Sports France, which holds exclusive broadcast rights to LaLiga in France as part of a deal with the Spanish league, intervened voluntarily in all seven cases.

As the company that acquired exclusive French broadcasting rights for LaLiga, it qualifies under the second category in Article L. 333-10. Unlike LaLiga, beIN could also point to documented harm, including evidence that 35 disputed domain names were streaming LaLiga matches, with beIN Sports branding visible in the pirate feeds.

The court ultimately concluded that there was grave and repeated infringement of beIN Sports France’s exclusive rights in all seven cases and granted the blocking orders in its name.

Blocking The Full Stack

What further stands out is the fact that these orders all came out on the same day, targeting nineteen French ISPs, three DNS resolvers, a CDN provider, and four VPN services. This broad approach ensures that the most popular circumvention options are immediately cut off.

The orders run until June 21, 2026, and are also dynamic in nature. This means that new domain names can be added in the future, once they are approved for blocking by France’s audiovisual regulator, ARCOM.

The ISP order will have the most direct impact. It includes France’s largest providers, such as Orange, SFR, Free, and Bouygues Telecom, as well as various smaller ones.

If subscribers try to circumvent these blocking measures by switching to alternative DNS resolvers, orders against Google, Cloudflare, and Quad9 will prevent this.

VPN providers are not necessarily an option either, as the court granted blocking orders against ProtonVPN, as well as CyberGhost and ExpressVPN. LaLiga also referenced orders against NordVPN and Surfshark jointly, but TorrentFreak was unable to locate these.

The Cloudflare order is the most technically comprehensive of the batch. It covers not only Cloudflare’s public DNS resolver but also its CDN, reverse proxy service, and WARP service under a single ruling. The court requires Cloudflare to block the domains across its infrastructure, by whatever technical means it chooses.

Some of the defendants raised counterarguments in court. For example, several VPN providers argued that Article L. 333-10 conflicts with the EU E-Commerce Directive, while others sought a referral to the Court of Justice. However, none of these arguments convinced the court.

Site Blocking Evolution

The seven court orders represent the most comprehensive single-day blocking action under France’s sports piracy framework, as far as we know. Whereas initial orders targeted single intermediary categories, these come in one full sweep.

LaLiga president Javier Tebas is pleased with the outcome and thanks beIN for their cooperation.

“These rulings represent a significant step forward because they extend protection to the entire technical ecosystem that piracy currently relies on. The fight against audiovisual fraud must grow through collaboration, as is the case here with beIN Sports France, which has been key to developing a solid and effective defense in the French market,” Tebas said.

After multiple successful site-blocking petitions, it’s clear that the French court sees a blocking role for a wide variety of intermediaries. This was recently confirmed by the Paris Court of Appeal too.

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

Europol and Eurojust announced the action with considerable fanfare but declined to name the service. However, at the time we confirmed that a key target was RapidIPTV, a platform that had been quietly running an IPTV streaming empire since at least 2014.

The authorities saw A.Z. as the alleged mastermind behind the empire, which also offered a ‘franchise’ model. The man, known to his colleagues as “Dash the Iranian,” was arrested, and this week, after nearly six years of pre-trial proceedings, the prosecution formally started in court.

RapidIPTV Kingpin Goes to Trial

Spain’s National Court (Audiencia Nacional) began hearing the case on Tuesday against five defendants, all of Iranian origin. The charges cover membership of a criminal organization, intellectual property crimes, offenses against the market and consumers, as well as money laundering.

In sharp contrast to the multi-year wait following the arrests, the trial was relatively short-lived.

After three hours of negotiation, all defendants reached an agreement with prosecutors, according to EFE. The prosecution agreed to drop the most serious charge, membership of a criminal organization, after the defendants pleaded guilty to the three other charges.

This resulted in a large sentencing reduction. The prosecution had originally sought 22 and a half years of prison time for A.Z., but the agreed sentence was just over two years. Similarly, the money-laundering fine that initially could be as high as €70 million was reduced to €8 million as part of the deal.

Because all sides agreed to the plea deal, it cannot be appealed by any party. This effectively ends the prosecution. The sentences for the remaining defendants were not reported.

€12 Million for the Rights-Holders

In addition to the €8 million fine to the state, the sentence also includes a damages fee of €12 million for the affected companies. The court also ordered the confiscation of all material seized during the raids, as well as all funds and accounts held by the defendants.

The private prosecution coalition was an unusually large one. Warner Bros, Universal, Columbia, Sony Pictures, Paramount, New Line, Netflix, Amazon, Disney, and LaLiga had all joined the action under Spain’s acusación particular mechanism, to hold the IPTV operators responsible.

How much money can eventually be recouped has yet to be seen, but with an estimated 2 million subscribers, the operation generated substantial revenue.

A Building in Iran, a Flat in Barcelona

The money-laundering element of the case was also notable. Prosecutors alleged that the group moved approximately €25.1 million through payment processors, cryptocurrency exchanges, shell companies, and falsified invoices.

Specific transactions identified by investigators included the construction of a residential building in Iran, the purchase of a Barcelona property valued at €1.6 million, and the purchase of two luxury vehicles worth a combined €400,000.

Those figures partially overlap with what was already public: at the time of the 2020 raids, Europol reported that police seized real estate, cars, jewelry, cash, and cryptocurrency worth approximately €4.8 million, and €1.1 million frozen in bank accounts.

The platform used various domain names, including rapidiptv.com, rapidiptv.net, iptvstack.com, and the iptv.community forum. According to the prosecution, it captured signals from licensed pay-TV platforms and routed them through a private server network of 50 servers in at least 13 countries across Europe and North America.

Interestingly, iptvstack.com and iptv.community both remain operational at the time of writing.

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

Several Game of Thrones episodes leaked in the past, and the same applies to the sequel, House of the Dragon.

With the long-awaited third season of HBO’s hit series Euphoria coming up this weekend, the company was on high alert. So, when it saw several ‘spoilers’ being posted by an X account operating under the name “Lexi howard’s cat”, it wasted no time to take action.

The Lexi-inspired fan account has been around for a long time, sharing various Euphoria-related updates. However, a series of posts that were published in late March appeared to have hit too close to home.

On March 31, HBO’s parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) sent a takedown notice to X, flagging several posts. According to Michael Bentkover, WBD’s Director of Worldwide Online Enforcement, these were “spoilers for unaired episodes of our Euphoria TV Series”.

TorrentFreak was unable to find out what was posted exactly, but the DMCA notice identifies it as video/audiovisual recording.

X confirmed receipt on the same day and presumably removed the posts. However, that was not the end of it. A week later, on April 7, the company requested a DMCA subpoena at a California federal court, with the goal to identify the person behind the @maudesfancat account.

DMCA subpoenas are relatively easy to obtain, as they only require a court clerk to sign off, which indeed happened a day later.

The issued subpoena requires X to share information sufficient to identify the person behind the account. This includes names, addresses, telephone numbers, email addresses, account numbers, IP addresses, and any other contact or billing records held by the platform.

Unlike the DMCA notice, where WBD used “video” to describe the content, the declaration to the court by Michael Bentkover classifies the infringing content as “summaries of unpublished, character, setting, and plots of a forthcoming series”.

This distinction may matter, as a summary of a plot may not enjoy the same protection as a leaked video. Copyright generally protects the expression of a work, not the underlying ideas or plot descriptions.

Then again, Bentkover also states that the user in question “posted access to HBO’s unpublished, copyright protected work from its forthcoming series,” which sounds substantial.

For now, X Corp. has until April 23 to respond. Legally, both X and the account holder can challenge the subpoena, but no objections have been submitted in court yet. Meanwhile, the ‘Lexi howard’s cat’ account is no longer online.

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A copy of the subpoena, filed April 8 at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, is available here (pdf). The notice of filing and supporting declaration can be found here (pdf).

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

The operators of the Asian drama and anime portal never revealed who was behind that pressure, but court records later showed it was Wavve Americas Inc., the parent company of legal Korean streaming service Kocowa.

Wavve had filed a copyright lawsuit in Arizona federal court against the unknown operators of multiple Dramacool domains, hoping to take the associated sites offline permanently.

Defendants Go Silent

When Wavve eventually identified the defendants, they were scattered across Thailand, Vietnam, Pakistan, the Netherlands, and New Jersey.

Kocowa identified domain operators in Thailand, Vietnam, Pakistan, the Netherlands, and New Jersey. The amended complaint named Asian C, Tommy USA, Najeeb Ullah Mirani, Baidar Bakhtand, and Dorothy Bradshaw, none appeared in court to answer the complaint.

Meanwhile, some Dramacool domains remained operational. While these may include copycat sites unrelated to the original operation, the ongoing copyright infringement is a serious problem for Kocowa.

To break this impasse, Wavve filed a motion for default judgment in September 2025, noting that some defendants had not only ignored the litigation but expanded their operations to new domains while the case was pending.

The company did not seek any monetary compensation but simply requested an order that would allow the company to take over the Dramacool domain names.

Default Judgment Entered

Earlier this week, U.S. District Judge Krissa M. Lanham granted the motion for a default judgment in full. The court found the requested injunction proportional and appropriate.

“Requiring defendants stop their infringing activities will not cause any legitimate hardship. And the public interest is served in enforcing copyright law. A permanent injunction prohibiting defendants from continuing their activities is appropriate,” the order reads.

The order prohibits all defendants from operating the sixteen named domain names, including watchasia.to and asianwiki.co, and also bars them from registering or owning any new piracy-linked domain names.

Wavve had acknowledged that an award for monetary damages would be meaningless, as the foreign pirate site operators are unresponsive. Therefore, they set all their hopes on a domain transfer order, which the court granted as well.

Domain Transfers Granted

In the order, Judge Lanham acknowledged that domain transfers are legally contested territory in copyright cases. The standard trademark statute that typically enables such transfers does not apply here, as the lawsuit did not include trademark claims.

However, since none of the defendants put up a defense and because several of the associated sites remain online, the transfers were granted. This was in part justified by judgments in a number of other courts, which approved domain transfers in similar copyright cases.

The order notes that domain transfers can be an appropriate remedy when there are indications that the defendants will not comply with an injunction. That is the case here, Judge Lanham concluded.

“Here, defendants concealed their identities, ignored this litigation, and have an ‘established practice of evading copyright enforcement by moving their operation to new domains, even after having a judgment rendered against them’,” the order reads,

“Wavve is entitled to an order transferring the domain names,” Judge Lanham adds.

Dramacool Domains Still Online

Whether Wavve can actually take control of all 16 domains remains to be seen, as not all registrars and registries may comply with U.S. court orders.

Several of the original Dramacool-operated domains, including dramanice.la, runasian.net, watchasia.to, asianc.sh, and asianwiki.co, have been offline since the November 2024 shutdown.

However, at least three of the named domains are still actively serving pirated content several days after the judgment was entered. Dramacool.bg, dramacool.com.tr, and dramacool.ba all remain online, redirecting visitors to functional streaming sites with full drama libraries.

In closing, it is worth stressing that the permanent injunction prevents the defendants from registering new domain names for infringing purposes. However, the domain transfer order targeted at registrars and registries, is limited to the sixteen named domain names.

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A copy of the default judgment order, issued by U.S. District Judge Krissa M. Lanham, is available here (pdf). The clerk’s entry of default judgment is available here (pdf).

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

The record labels accused the Astound-owned ISP of not doing enough to stop pirating subscribers. Specifically, they alleged that the company failed to terminate repeat infringers.

The trial lasted more than two weeks and ended in a resounding victory for the labels. A Texas federal jury found Grande liable for willful contributory copyright infringement, and the ISP was ordered to pay $47 million in damages to the record labels. The copyright infringement verdict was confirmed by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, though the Fifth Circuit ordered a new trial on damages.

The verdict was not the final word yet, as Grande petitioned the Supreme Court last year, urging the justices to take up the case and review the Fifth Circuit’s decision.

Grande’s petition centered on the crucial question of ISP liability in cases of contributory copyright infringement. Grande framed the issue as an “exceptionally important question under the Copyright Act,” highlighting a “nationwide litigation campaign by the U.S. recording industry” to hold ISPs liable for copyright violations carried out by their customers.

The central question is as follows:  

“Whether an ISP is liable for contributory copyright infringement by (i) providing content-neutral internet access to the general public and (ii) failing to terminate that access after receiving two third-party notices alleging someone at a customer’s IP address has infringed.”

Knowledge is Not Intent

The case and the questions are similar to the Cox v. Sony case, which the Supreme Court decided in favor of the Internet provider last month. In a 7-2 decision, it concluded that an ISP cannot be held contributorily liable for copyright infringement merely because it kept providing service to subscribers that were flagged for piracy.

In Cox, the Supreme Court stated that contributory liability requires proof that the provider intended its service to be used for infringement. That intent can only be shown in one of two ways. Either the provider actively induced infringement, or the service is one that has no substantial non-infringing uses.

“Under our precedents, a company is not liable as a copyright infringer for merely providing a service to the general public with knowledge that it will be used by some to infringe copyrights. Accordingly, we reverse,” Justice Thomas wrote in the opinion last month.

The Court also directly countered the Fourth Circuit’s reasoning, which held that supplying a product with “knowledge” of future infringement was enough to establish liability.

Supreme Court Sends Grande v. UMG Back to Fifth Circuit

With Cox v. Sony now settled, the Supreme Court turned its attention to Grande’s pending petition. Rather than taking up the case on the merits, the Court issued a GVR order, granting the petition, vacating the Fifth Circuit’s judgment, and remanding the case for reconsideration under the Cox standard.

The order effectively removes the case from the Supreme Court docket, urging the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to take another look at its decision in light of the new ruling.

Given the similarities between the two cases, it is no surprise that the Supreme Court came to this conclusion.

It is now up to the Fifth Circuit to revisit whether Grande’s conduct meets the intent threshold that was established in Cox. That is a significantly higher bar than the one applied in the original verdict, which found that continuing to provide service to known infringers was enough to establish material contribution.

The music companies previously said they sent over a million copyright infringement notices, but that Grande failed to terminate even a single subscriber account in response. However, without proof of active inducement, these absolute numbers carry less weight now.

Whether this translates into a win for Grande on remand remains to be seen. For now, however, the original $47 million verdict is further away than ever.

This week’s GVR order is just one of the many ripple effects of the Sony ruling on other contributory infringement cases. Last week, we reported how X already asked the court to dismiss its liability battle with several music publishers. Meanwhile, the ruling will also directly impact Verizon’s repeat infringer battle with the music industry.

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

The music publishers, meanwhile, were busy in a different court, asking a Texas judge to throw out X’s antitrust complaint against them with similar finality.

The motion to dismiss, filed in the Northern District of Texas, argues that X’s lawsuit doesn’t hold up and the music companies want all eight counts dismissed with prejudice.

A Conspiracy Built on One Word

X filed its antitrust complaint in January, accusing the National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) and a coalition of major music publishers, including Sony, Universal, and Warner Chappell, of coordinating a “weaponized” DMCA takedown campaign to coerce X into industry-wide licensing deals.

The conspiracy claim rested heavily on a pre-litigation email sent by NMPA President David Israelite to Twitter in October 2021. X alleged that Israelite threatened a “massive program” of DMCA notices on a scale “larger than any previous effort in DMCA history” if X did not agree to a partnership.

However, the publishers have now submitted the full email chain to the court, arguing that X’s complaint “selectively crops, paraphrases, and misconstrues” it. They note that the complete exchange tells a more nuanced story.

In his October 6 email, Israelite warned Twitter that the NMPA was preparing a “massive program” of DMCA notices, adding that his “preference is not to go down that road, but instead to develop a partnership.” He closed by writing (emphasis added): “If you are interested in engaging in such a conversation, please let me know. If you choose not to do so, then please know we are open to starting a conversation at any point during the future process.”

The publishers argue that X’s conspiracy theory rests almost entirely on that final word.

“X argues that by using the word ‘we,’ NMPA meant that X could only deal with the Music Publishers collectively for a license and that no individual Music Publisher would negotiate separately. That inference is not only implausible, it is completely devoid of factual basis or allegation. An antitrust claim cannot rest on such a tenuous thread.”

Same Judge, Same Problem

One of the key reasons for a dismissal is the argument that there can be no antitrust injury, as X and the music publishers do not compete. The music companies argue that antitrust law requires a competitor to be involved in a refusal-to-deal claim.

The argument has already succeeded once against X, in the same courthouse, before the same judge. In February, District Judge Jane Boyle dismissed X’s antitrust lawsuit against the World Federation of Advertisers with prejudice, finding that X had failed to allege antitrust injury because no competitor was involved in the alleged boycott.

The publishers quote that ruling extensively and argue the present case is largely similar.

“Specifically, X does not allege that any participant in the alleged conspiracy is its competitor, a necessary requirement for antitrust injury to flow from an alleged refusal to deal,” the motion states.

The proposed order submitted alongside the motion has Judge Boyle’s name pre-filled.

Retaliation, Not Antitrust

The music publishers take their motion to dismiss beyond simply refuting X’s claims. They also suggest that X filed the antitrust suit as leverage in the copyright infringement case the music companies filed in the Tennessee federal court.

“The paucity of factual allegations supporting an antitrust claim is no accident. X’s motivation in filing suit was different: retaliation and leverage for the copyright suit the Music Publishers filed against it, which is currently pending in Tennessee federal court,” the motion notes.

X argues that the music companies sent a flood of “baseless” DMCA notices, targeting over 200,000 posts and suspending 50,000 users. However, the music publishers motion counters that none of the takedown notices was objectively baseless.

The Sham Exception

The music companies argue that their takedown campaign was a First Amendment-protected pre-litigation activity. They invoke the Noerr-Pennington doctrine, which shields things such as pre-litigation notices and cease-and-desist letters from antitrust liability.

DMCA takedown notices, they argue, fall in the same category, especially since these were used as key evidence in the the copyright lawsuit currently pending in Tennessee.

This type of protection does not apply if the notices themselves are “baseless” or a “sham,” which X argued is the case here. The original complaint pointed to several examples, including a takedown notice targeting a video where the non-commercial use of background music was flagged as copyright infringement.

The music companies, however, counter that X does and cannot claim that any notices were baseless. This includes the background music example: this may qualify for fair use defense, but the publishers add that “infringing use of incidental background music is still infringing.”

All in all, the motion to dismiss concludes that the music companies used the DMCA as Congress intended, and that it is not an antitrust violation. The complaint should therefore be dismissed with prejudice on all counts.

It is now up to Judge Boyle to decide whether the antitrust case can continue or whether it should be dismissed outright. The same is true for the Nashville case, where X asked the court to completely dismiss the music companies’ copyright infringement lawsuit.

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A copy of the motion to dismiss, filed April 2, 2026 at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, is available here (pdf). The supporting memorandum can be found here (pdf).

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