Dramacool and several associated sites suddenly shut down last November, with the operators mentioning copyright pressure as a prime reason.

The move disappointed millions of Asian drama and anime pirates but the nature of Dramacool’s legal troubles was initially unknown.

A few months later, legal paperwork eventually revealed that a U.S. court order, obtained by Wavve Americas (wA), the owner of legal streaming platform Kocowa, was the likely culprit. That lawsuit also aims to bring Dramacool’s operators to justice.

Dramacool Remnants Remain

Kocowa identified domain operators in Thailand, Vietnam, Pakistan, the Netherlands, and New Jersey, but none of their targets appeared in court to formally answer the complaint.

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

Last week, parent company wA explained these ongoing challenges in a motion for default judgment filed at a federal court in Arizona,

“[I]n some cases, Defendants have even moved and/or expanded their infringement operations to new domains. For example, wA discovered that Defendant Mirani further operates dramacool.sr, and offers infringing content via this domain name,” the company explained.

“Similarly, Defendant Bakht further operates dramacooltv.cz and dramacooli.cz and offers infringing content via these domain names, with access to dramacool.com.vc and Fdramacooli.cz, as of the filing of this Motion, being redirected to dramacooltv.cz.”

Kocowa Wants All Dramacool Domains

Since none of the defendants appeared in court, Kocowa requested a default judgment. That could open the door to millions of dollars in statutory damages, but the company isn’t interested in money.

Instead, wA seeks a default judgment and permanent injunction, to restrain the defendants from engaging in any infringing conduct going forward while taking ownership of all infringing domains.

These include the domains associated with the original Dramacool operation, as well as copycats and other new domains that have since been launched.

Targeting Future Domains

Taking ownership of these domain names only solves part of the problem, as the defendants could simply register new ones. Therefore, the proposed order also prohibits them from registering or owning any domains that support future infringing activity.

Since the defendants may not comply, wA wants the order to apply to “all those persons or entities who receive actual notice of the order”. This means that U.S.-based domain registrars like Namecheap and GoDaddy would be legally required to enforce the order.

The court has yet to grant the default judgment and permanent injunction. If it does, wA will effectively take over the existing Dramacool domains, provided that the current domain name registrars cooperate, and will have the authority to take over any new domains that pop up in the future.

—

A copy of Wavve Americas’ motion for a default judgment and a permanent injunction is available here (pdf). A copy of the proposed order can be found here (pdf)

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

Ну что, штык в землю? Не думаю...©

❝In the event Hamas delays or rejects this proposal, the above, including the scaled-up aid operation, will proceed in the terror-free areas handed over from the I.D.F. to the I.S.F.❞

Гандон-бородавка

❝В 2024 году Общественный форум Финляндии, который классифицирует каналы публикации для академических исследований, понизил рейтинг 193 журналов MDPI до самого низкого уровня, 0. ❞

When studying law in Taiwan back in 2019, Kevin Lin learned that law firms were doing good business in the anti-piracy space. After he graduated, he aimed to do the same.

Around June 2022, reports emerged that Lin was a suspect in what was described locally as a “copyright cockroach” case.

After teaming up with a like-minded former classmate who happened to be a lawyer, Lin founded Truth Intellectual Property Consulting Co, a company that would soon begin to sue hundreds of people for illegally downloading and sharing movies on BitTorrent. The scenario is not especially unusual but the background certainly is.

Download, Seed, Sue

In order to gather evidence to support the upcoming campaign, Truth Intellectual Property signed a monitoring deal with a technology company. Through that deal, Lin was introduced to lawyer Zheng Yuanxiang, who reportedly drafted the complaints against the alleged downloaders and negotiated the settlements. The difference in this case was the nature of the content the users downloaded.

After obtaining the exclusive rights to several movies from Vie Vision Pictures Co. and Applause Entertainment Ltd, men working for Lin uploaded the movies to BitTorrent and waited for pirates to take the bait.

Unwitting pirates had their IP addresses captured and once identified were targeted with demands for cash settlements. The rightsholders agreed to a 20% cut, with Lin’s operation taking the remaining 80%, part of which covered the costs with the remainder taken as profit.

The End of the Settlement Dream

After launching the operation in August 2021, Lin’s company filed 937 lawsuits for copyright infringement. Just 25 cases resulted in a cash settlement, netting a grand total equivalent to less than US$30,000.

The authorities had received a number of complaints, but it appears that the litigation strategy had also overwhelmed several police departments and prosecutors’ offices.

Lin and the other men were indicted, with the Taipei District Court eventually finding them guilty of engaging in “corporate-style litigation” in violation of the Lawyers Act among other offenses.

Lin received a 10-month prison sentence, commutable to a fine equivalent to US$10,000. His co-defendants, including a company registration manager, two employees, and a legal officer, were also sentenced to prison terms of 6 to 8 months, commutable to fines.

For the crime of handling litigation cases with intent to profit, lawyer Zheng Yuanxiang was also sentenced to prison. All defendants – and the prosecution – appealed the District Court’s verdict.

Taiwan High Court

At the Taiwan High Court, the prosecution argued that Kevin Lin (also known as Lin Yijie), along with the other defendants, had engaged in a scheme in which they intended to profit from copyright infringement.

The prosecution said that the defendants used their legal connections to lure internet users into downloading pirated content with the intent of pressurizing them into settling their dispute.

The defense countered with claims that the prosecution’s case was based on flawed evidence that failed to establish intent. Kevin Lin was simply a mediator between various parties involved in the scheme, the defense argued, noting that he had not directly profited from it. And besides, in similar cases defendants had been found not guilty, the defense added.

All Defendants Acquitted

On September 25, 2025, the Taiwan High Court acquitted all defendants, reversing the verdict of the lower court. The Court agreed that the prosecution’s evidence was insufficient to link the men to the scheme and criticized the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office for an investigation with inconsistent findings.

The Court found that the exclusive licensing deal between Truth Intellectual Property and Vie Vision and Applause Entertainment, wasn’t illegal but did stray close to the line. The Court found no evidence of collusion; legal action was conducted in the Truth company’s name so it wasn’t litigating on behalf of others.

The Court further found that the conditions for offenses under Article 157 of the Criminal Code and Article 127 of the Lawyers Act, which forbids unlicensed lawyers conducting litigation for profit, had not been met. The Court also noted that those who collected the evidence for use in legal action could not be held responsible for the actions of others.

Allegations that the defendants profited from the scheme reportedly failed to establish intent. Rather than a reliance on evidence, the Court found that the prosecution relied on speculation and ultimately failed to meet the burden of proof.

Lin Comments on Social Media

In a post on social media, Lin celebrated the win but avoided any comment on the details. An elusive detail concerns the claim that the defendants uploaded the same content they later sued people for downloading.

The Taipei Times is very specific about how the content was obtained and then seeded. Yet, far as we know, that aspect wasn’t a key part of the case.

Regardless, Lin seems very pleased with the outcome.

After three and a half years of highly publicized judicial proceedings, the High Court panel has officially ruled not guilty!

During this long and agonizing period, I have endured baseless accusations and unjust treatment. This just verdict from the High Court is not only a belated vindication, but also proves that my actions were always legal and not in the best light as accused.

From my student days at Taipei Physical Education Institute and National Chung Cheng University, to my later studies at the Graduate School of Law at National Chengchi University and the Executive MBA program at the College of Management at National Taiwan University, I have always believed in education, law, and justice.

This ruling also demonstrates the power of the judiciary to restore order.

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

Аргумент в пользу кашрута

Знатокам ИИ, вопрос про видосы

O новоуспенном священномученике

Authorities in the United States have seized many domain names over the years, including those associated with online piracy.

In some cases, domains are seized as part of a criminal prosecution. Megaupload.com, for example, was taken down thirteen years ago and remains under the control of the United States which renews its registration annually.

Not all seizures are treated equally, however. In some cases, domains are simply let back into the system after they expire, allowing anyone with an interest in the brand to pick them up relatively cheaply. Domain squatters pick up some, while others simply end up in the hands of ‘pirates’ once again.

U.S. Seized Streameast Domains

Earlier in September, there was much ado about the takedown of what was reportedly the largest pirate sports streaming network. The Streameast operation did not involve the U.S. government, nor was it targeted at the original Streameast, but it was a massive victory nonetheless.

The original Streameast has not been spared legal trouble either. In fact, its domain names were seized by U.S. authorities last year. While the site swiftly moved to new domains, the old ones were pointing to a seizure banner.

“It is unlawful to reproduce or distribute copyrighted material including sporting events, television shows, movies, music, software, or games without authorization. Individuals who do so risk criminal prosecution under Title 18,” the banner explained.

The seizures were backed up by a warrant obtained in August 2024 at a Louisiana federal court, targeting Thestreameast.to, Streameast.io, Streameast.live, Streameast.xyz, Thestreameast.io, and Thestreameast.xyz.

Streameast ‘Reclaims’ Streameast.xyz

Today, some of these seized domains continue to point to the original warning banner but it appears that the U.S. authorities no longer control all of them.

While researching both old and newly-seized Streameast domains recently, we noticed that Streameast.xyz expired earlier this year. Apparently, it was not renewed by those who controlled it, as the seizure banner was gone.

Instead, the domain appeared to have been reclaimed by the original Streameast team. While it is not listed as an official mirror site, Streameast.xyz points to content from the original site once again. And indeed, the original Streameast team confirms that the domain is theirs.

It is not clear why the U.S. authorities lost control of the domain or whether it was intentional. Other domain names covered by the same seizure warrant were renewed recently, including Streameast.io.

The Streameast team might view this as a significant symbolic victory. After all, they effectively reclaimed a federally seized domain name without having to mount a legal challenge.

In the grander scheme, one domain name is not going to make a massive difference. However, the U.S. government went through the trouble to obtain a federal warrant, so it’s ironic to see it controlled by pirates once again.

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

И терпентин ИИ на что-нибудь полезен!

❝Фраза «и терпентин на что-нибудь полезен» является цитатой из сатирической поэмы Михаила Юрьевича Лермонтова «Смерть Поэта», опубликованной в 1837 году.

В контексте стихотворения эта фраза произносится саркастически, выражая иронию и недоумение по поводу бессмысленности действий и насмешку над ритуалами вокруг смерти поэта — Александра Пушкина. Терпентин упоминается как что-то вроде условного символа пустой помощи и бесполезного лечения.

То есть эта цитата принадлежит Лермонтову и используется в рамках его сатирической лирики.❞

Nearly a quarter of a century after its debut, internet users stocking up on the latest multi-GB Linux distros can still do so with help from the BitTorrent protocol.

Able to download chunks of even the largest files, distributed among other users who could be anywhere on the planet, BitTorrent’s file transfer skills are two decades old yet never fail to impress.

For those yet to sample the magic of magnet links, the whole process begins with a humble .torrent file. These relatively small files contain metadata relating to the large file the user wants to download, including the location of one or more ‘trackers’, the central online servers that facilitate communication between users’ torrent clients.

Yet the real magic lies in BitTorrent’s resilience; it has a secret weapon that can find those chunks of data, wherever they may be, even when central trackers are blocked or shut down. It’s called DHT – Distributed Hash Table – and it’s one of the key reasons BitTorrent still performs so well on the global stage, even today.

Trackers Are Useful But Disposable

A central server known as a tracker communicates with torrent clients to coordinate transfers of files between them. When a client requests a piece of a file the tracker knows is available, the tracker tells the client which other clients have it and from there, transfers take place peer-to-peer. Periodically, clients update the tracker with new information about the network, and so the cycle continues.

DHT, on the other hand, empowers torrent clients with the ability to receive and impart information directly with other clients. By creating distributed network knowledge, there’s no absolute need for a tracker, eliminating a potential central point of failure.

Peers knowledge of other peers is boosted by Peer Exchange or PEX, a system through which a client that’s connected to another client, shares the IP addresses of peers it already knows. This increases the recipient client’s pool of connectivity opportunities and, if all goes well, speeds up downloads.

When new clients join the DHT, other torrent clients share content locations with the newcomer and, given time, the client returns the favor by passing information to other clients following similar requests.

The process is boosted locally using PEX, but the aim is the same – discovery of other clients/peers to create a more robust network with more effective file transfers.

In short, DHT makes every client a node in a vast decentralized network, with each sharing their growing knowledge of the network with other clients, that in turn have knowledge they’ll automatically share with others.

No single client knows the location of everything and even the pooled knowledge of thousands is unlikely to produce a full network map. However, most clients know enough to point out the location of at least something useful, and with PEX, they’ll provide the locations of other clients which helps to strengthen the overall network.

To many people the sharing of content is the most visible aspect of BitTorrent, but its real strength lies in the sharing of information that maintains the underlying network. The network that underlies that obviously plays a massive role too.

Tens of Millions of Peers But Hard to Measure

In the bigger picture, the loss of few clients from public DHT is a non-event. Indeed, the sudden shut down of a major residential internet provider somewhere in the world may not be especially disruptive either, given the scale of the network. Yet putting an exact figure on the size of the network has to date proven elusive.

The lowest estimates always start in the millions of peers, with some researchers previously reporting anything from 20 to 30 million, sometimes a few million more, other times a few million less.

Researchers behind BoonTorrent, a now seven-year-old project to create a real-time monitoring tool for BitTorrent DHT traffic, reported that “BitTorrent traffic is abundant, but difficult to analyze. To capture enough data for significant analysis, a large distributed solution is needed.”

Their solution included a heatmap visualization of the previous two minutes of traffic, with two examples shown below.

BoonTorrent DHT Heatmap 1

BoonTorrent DHT Heatmap 2

Depending on the circumstances, we know that the number of peers can vary by at least 10 million, possibly more at times, or less.

That being said, these images suggest that Southeast Asia and Russia had quite the presence on BitTorrent’s DHT seven years ago. That’s a long time in internet years and everything is subject to change.

Some ISPs Play Big Roles Supporting DHT Worldwide

As far as we’re aware, there are no large, recent studies on BitTorrent’s DHT so the overall numbers remain as elusive as ever. However, when using the tools available at IPinfo.io, something unexpected appeared; tracking data for BitTorrent’s DHT and some estimates based on IPinfo’s visibility of the network.

The data displayed as of today concerns the number of IP addresses and their corresponding ASNs observed on the Mainline DHT in the past 30 days. The data obtained by TF from IPinfo.io just a few days ago is broadly the same.

When drilling down into the details, the data provides an overview of the ISPs with the greatest number of allocated IP addresses observed on the DHT network.

Top ISPs With a Strong Customer DHT Presence

With 3,152,801 IP addresses observed on the DHT during the previous 30 days, Russian ISP PJSC Rostelecom comfortably takes the top spot. Lagging two million IP addresses behind, Korea Telecom takes second place (1,143,168 IPs) with CHINANET-BACKBONE narrowly behind with 1,131,734 observed IPs.

Positioned between ISPs from China and Morocco, Comcast Cable Communications takes 9th place with 377,976 observed IP addresses, with the UK’s British Telecommunications PLC edging out competition from Egypt and Turkey with 218,365 IP addresses. Given the site-blocking measures in place at BT, that’s a considerable number of subscribers sharing content openly, with no apparent need for a VPN.

The full list is available below, with a bonus column of most popular content downloaded by users in each country, tracked by IKnowWhatYouDownloaded on the DHT itself. Ultimately, the data provides a clear snapshot of BitTorrent’s modern landscape and the international telecom giants its users connect from.

It’s worth noting that a) this view of the DHT may not be complete and b) countries without a dominant national ISP may have many smaller ISPs not covered in the report. Even with that caveat, pushing Russia from the top spot overall seems unlikely since it already appears three times in the same table.

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

А я всегда это говорил...

https://t.me/crescentscroissants/6942

Four years ago, Bungie filed a complaint at a federal court in Seattle, accusing Destiny 2 cheat seller AimJunkies.com of copyright and trademark infringement, among other things.

The same accusations were also leveled against Phoenix Digital Group, several people connected to the company, and a third-party developer.

Bungie Wins Landmark Jury Trial

After years of legal back-and-forth, in May 2024 the case became the first of its kind to go before a jury. In court, AimJunkies emphasized that it had never accessed or modified any of Destiny 2’s copyrighted game code. Bungie, on the other hand, argued that AimJunkies’ copyright-infringing activities were blatant and obvious.

At the end of the trial, the Seattle jury ruled in favor of the video game company, finding all defendants liable for direct, vicarious, and contributory copyright infringement. Phoenix Digital Group and all individual defendants were ordered to pay damages equivalent to the actual profits they earned, a total of $63,210.

The jury verdict was a clear victory for Bungie, but it didn’t mark the end of the legal battle. AimJunkies challenged the verdict and several related orders at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Cease-Fire as Settlement Looms?

In December 2024, the parties began discussing a settlement. However, the follow-up did not go as smoothly as planned, and by August 2025, there were doubts that a final agreement was imminent.

“Although Appellants have diligently sought to settle this case since late last year, Bungie, Inc.’s lack of responsiveness and constant claims of its counsel that Bungie needed to be consulted for even the most routine questions have kept this from happening,” AimJunkies’ attorney informed the court in August.

Because the attorney was facing health issues himself, AimJunkies filed a request to postpone his opening brief until September 19, 2025. However, that brief never came, as both parties eventually agreed to dismiss the appeal at the last minute, which effectively ended the legal battle.

AimJunkies Throws in the Towel

On Monday, the AimJunkies defendants and Bungie informed the court of their decision. The brief doesn’t mention a settlement of any kind but notes that each party will bear its own costs and fees.

The dismissal means that the jury verdict will stand. As such, the AimJunkies team is required to pay the damages award of $63,210. In addition, Bungie was previously awarded almost $4.4 million in damages and fees in a separate arbitration proceeding, which also remains intact.

Bungie has not commented publicly on the outcome of the legal battle, but we received a message, purportedly from an AimJunkies representative, informing us that the appeal had been dropped with AimJunkies aaccepting full responsibility.

“[W]e dropped the last appeal related to our dispute with Bungie related to the creation, development, advertising, sale, and distribution of the Destiny 2 cheat software previously sold on AimJunkies.com and related websites,” the email begins.

“We acknowledge and admit that the cheat software infringed Bungie’s registered copyrights in Destiny 2 in violation of United States copyright law, circumvented Bungie’s technological protection measures in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, violated Bungie’s Limited Software License Agreement (‘LSLA’), and caused the users of the cheat software to violate their respective LSLAs with Bungie, among other violations of law.

“We apologize to Bungie and the many Destiny 2 players impacted and harmed by our actions,” the email concludes.

The message above was sent before the dismissal was communicated to the court and arrived from an unknown email address. Follow-up attempts to verify its authenticity, including questions sent to AimJunkies’ attorney, remain unanswered. The same applies to our inquiries sent to Bungie’s legal team.

At the time of writing, the official AimJunkies website is offline, so it appears that the company may have given up on the entire operation, including cheats for other games that have nothing to do with Bungie.

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

Праздничная рюмка маниловки