On February 11, 2025, a coalition of forty media outlets took legal action in France hoping to slam the brakes on mass piracy of thousands of articles published each day.

Under the umbrella groups La Dépêche du Midi, La Montagne, Sud Ouest, Le Télégramme, Publihebdos, and La Nouvelle République du Centre, and together the “Alliance”, the publishers hoped to derail “parasitic” news platform, news.dayfr.com.

In operation since 2021, the apparently automated platform allegedly harvests the media companies’ articles. With assistance from AI, it then republishes plagiarized or obvious copies of the articles on its own portal. A regurgitation rate of between 5 and 15 articles every minute, means up to 6,000 articles are republished every day.

Investigation Reveals the Rest of the Iceberg

Days before the application was filed at the Court of Paris (Tribunal de Paris), articles appeared in French publications denouncing news.dayfr.com and its negative effects.

In an article published by Next, Jean-Marc Manach recalled holding a training session on fact-checking for a group of professional journalists. During that session, one participant apologized for taking a few moments to quickly complete and publish an article of their own.

“To illustrate why and how it was important to learn how to identify news articles and sites generated by AI (GenAI), I took the homepage of news.dayfr.com as an example,” Manach explained. “I had already identified it as the main GenAI plagiarist in French. But I didn’t expect the journalist to discover, stunned, that this site had just published a copy-paste of his article, posted online only half an hour earlier.”

A joint investigation by Libération and Next revealed that at least 1,000 similar sites churn out infringing content in much the same way. In some cases, AI ‘hallucinations’ aren’t noticed by site operators or the public, resulting in bogus automated news being taken as fact, then cited as source material for articles published on Wikipedia.

Articles reporting on the pirate news sites were reproduced by those very same sites, some with only minor cosmetic changes, as the example above shows. Other published articles were little more than elaborate fiction, yet still ended up on Google News due to the use of domains previously used by reputable resources.

Court of Paris Considers Request for Blocking

In a process that began on February 11, the plaintiffs summoned the leading ISPs in France – Bouygues Télécom, Free, Sfr, Sfr Fibre and Orange – to appear at a hearing on March 2025 before the Court of Paris. The aim was to obtain an order compelling the ISPs to block news.dayfr.com, to prevent customers from accessing plagiarized content.

The decision handed down by the Paris Court dated May 7 reveals that the ISPs – which currently block sites under a voluntary arrangement with the audiovisual industries – stopped short of offering their full cooperation.

ISP ‘Free’ sought assurances from the court that the requested measures respect the principle of proportionality and that blocking measures “would only be taken with respect to the domain name/address https://news.dayfr.com” and would only be in force for a maximum of 12 months.

Orange said it did not oppose the measures but asked the Court to confirm that the publishers had the right to act and that blocking measures would only target the sole domain identified in the application. Sfr and Sfr Fibre questioned whether the requested measures were proportionate and “strictly necessary”.

Site Previously Assessed by Judicial Commissioner

Blocking orders of this type can only be authorized by the judicial authority, after infringement of copyright or related rights has been established. The decision refers to reports drawn up by a judicial commissioner in December 2024, which found that many articles owned by various publishers had appeared on news.dayfr.com. Any changes made to the original works were swiftly dismissed as irrelevant.

“It is clear from all of these findings that the Alliance and the publishing companies have established with sufficient proof that the disputed site allows Internet users to access protected works without the authorization of the rights holders, notwithstanding the slight modifications made to the articles reproduced on the disputed site. The infringement of copyright and related rights has been established,” the decision reads.

The decision notes that the publishing companies are entitled to request measures to protect their rights, especially when considering obstacles that prevent the site’s operator being identified, such as hosting at Cloudflare.

“These elements demonstrate the knowledge of the entirely or almost entirely illicit nature of the links present on the disputed site by the people who contribute to this dissemination and the difficulty for the authors and producers to prosecute those responsible for this site,” the Court continues.

Blocking Order Granted

Having weighed the need for blocking measures against the risk of blocking legal content, the rights of the ISPs to conduct their business, and the infringing nature of the content in question, the Court ruled in favor of the publishers.

[The Court] orders the companies Orange, Sfr, Sfr fibre, Free and Bouygues télécom to implement or have implemented, at the latest within 15 days following the service of this judgment and for a period of 18 months from the implementation of the measures ordered, all measures likely to prevent access to the site , from French territory, including in the overseas departments or regions and single collectivities as well as in the Wallis and Futuna Islands, in New Caledonia and in the French Southern and Antarctic Territories, by their subscribers based on a contract taken out in this territory, by any effective means, and in particular by blocking the domain name

Orange, Sfr, Sfr fibre, Free and Bouygues telecom are responsible for any costs incurred when implementing the blocking and in the event that the measures face circumvention, the Court will consider submissions.

The question now is whether news.dayfr.com will attempt to circumvent blocking. Two changes are clear already; all articles listed in the publisher’s application have been taken down, and a new subdomain (euro.dayfr.com) is available. Unfortunately, a more significant issue may need to be addressed.

Dayfr.com may be considered a key threat to French publishers, but there’s nothing particularly unique about the site.

Look closely enough and the site’s ‘secret sauce’ becomes evident; it uses a content management system (Mubashier) ostensibly run from the Middle East, that’s also in use on many other sites. That raises the real possibility that successfully blocking dayfr.com would give rise to replacements using the same system.

Finally, in common with similar preconfigured platforms, Mubashier-powered sites may be expected to ‘just work’ right out of the box, without customers having to put in too much effort.

That seems to be a pretty good fit when considering the intended purpose of dayfr.com; automatically grab content and then publish it with minor tweaks, if any. Masquerading as a genuine news site only serves as a distraction for other things going on in the background, including dubious SEO schemes.

Among many pages hidden from search engines are URLs that reveal a bit more about how the sites obtain content, and a few other things which may be a little more exposed than intended.

Efforts by some to offload malware seemed particularly rude, especially after spending considerable energy claiming to be ethical news sites. Of course, Cloudflare may offer some protection, but clusters of sites hosted in Germany, and right under the publishers’ noses in France, may not always have the type of cover they expected.

The Tribunal de Paris blocking order is available here ( pdf , French)

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

Late 2022, several of the world’s largest music companies including Warner Bros. and Sony Music prevailed in their lawsuit against Internet provider Grande Communications.

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.

A Texas federal jury found Grande guilty of willful contributory copyright infringement, and the ISP was ordered to pay $47 million in damages .

The copyright infringement verdict was confirmed by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals but the lower court’s decision on how damages should be calculated was overturned. A new trial will determine the appropriate amount but in the meantime, Grande continues to protest the liability ruling.

Grande Petitions Supreme Court

Earlier this year, Grande asked the Supreme Court to intervene. The Internet provider argued that current law lacks clear standards for handling copyright infringement notices or terminating subscriber accounts.

The petition asked the Supreme Court to answer two key questions, which Grande phrased 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.”

Assuming that third-party notices are valid, other questions also remain unanswered. For example, is it fair to disconnect subscribers from vital services? How many notices should trigger a disconnection when ISPs receive millions of them? And should subscribers be protected in any way?

Grande essentially argues that the DMCA, as it’s written, is too ambiguous to handle the present repeat infringer conundrum. Ideally, the law should be clarified but for now it hopes that the court can provide additional clarity.

Music Companies: Rampant Infringement

Last week, the music companies responded to Grande’s argument. In an opposition brief, they note that the questions posed by the ISP are “utterly divorced from reality” and not worth the Court’s attention.

The brief counters the ISP’s focus on subscribers for which it received two copyright infringement notices, noting that the ISP had no intention of disconnecting any subscribers, no matter how many notices they received.

The music companies contend that Grande’s situation is not a symptom of confusing laws, but a consequence of its own “egregious” policies.

“In truth, Grande had a policy to never terminate service to a customer for engaging in copyright infringement,” the music companies write.

“The trial record demonstrated that Grande knew that dozens of its users infringed more than 1,000 times—and one infringed nearly 14,000 times— annually, yet Grande did nothing in response.”

The music companies stress that Grande had no problem terminating subscribers who didn’t pay their bills. However, when rightsholders repeatedly complained about pirating subscribers, it took no action.

The DMCA clearly states that ISPs must adopt and implement a repeat infringer policy to benefit from safe harbor protection. However, according to the music companies, Grande’s policy was to keep servicing these subscribers instead.

Supreme Court or Congress?

All in all, the plaintiffs see no reason for the Supreme Court to take on this case. If Grande believes that the DMCA safe harbor definitions should be changed, it should petition lawmakers, the music companies add.

“If Grande thinks the safe harbor should be radically expanded to allow the kind of shocking disregard for copyrights it displayed, it should take that up with Congress, not this Court.”

After hearing the positions of both sides, it is now up to the Supreme Court to decide whether it will take on this case or not.

Interestingly, this is not the only repeat infringer case currently under review. Last year, Cox Communications filed a similar petition , warning that the current situation could have devastating consequences for the ISP industry and the public.

The Supreme Court previously signaled interest in the issue. While it’s yet to accept the petition, the Court requested the U.S. Solicitor General’s views, to hear what the Government thinks about the matter.

—

A copy of the music companies’ opposition brief filed at the U.S. Supreme Court is available here (pdf)

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

For those who had fun playing #laligagate ‘collateral damage bingo’ over the weekend, a full house meant identifying the top internet intermediaries and services, blocked by LaLiga on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

Most services utilize shared IP addresses, so typically the number of non-pirate sites blocked at the same time can run to hundreds of sites, potentially more. According to hayahora.futbol data, the following were targeted more than most:

24x Cloudflare IP addresses, 3x Meteverse IP addresses, 3x Twitch, 2x QUICCloud, 2x Netify, and 1x InfinityFree.

GitHub Pages, Cloudflare, and Vercel are among those targeted previously but for whom blocking at one or more ISPs inexplicably remains in place. For those tracking recent events, seeing Vercel on the list again was an unwelcome surprise.

Vercel Blocked Again

Back in April, Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch described LaLiga’s blocking as “ indiscriminate ” and tantamount to an “unaccountable form of internet censorship.”

Yet, while Vercel didn’t hold back its critique, the company also pledged to contact LaLiga to see if surprise no-notice IP address blocking could be replaced by something a little more organized and substantially less blunt. Specifically, a blocking method that wouldn’t result in innocent sites being blocked at the same time.

In a post published Sunday on X, Rauch had some good news, and some bad news.

“We’ve been working with [the team at LaLiga] to ensure uninterrupted access in Spain to the @vercel global CDN,” Rauch revealed.

To help LaLiga mitigate the risk of overblocking, Gauch says the company set up an inbox which gave LaLiga direct access to its Site Reliability Engineering incident management system. This effectively meant that high priority requests could be processed swiftly, in line with LaLiga’s demands while avoiding collateral damage.

And the Bad News

“Vercel has set up a dedicated inbox for LaLiga to file reports. Sadly, they just blocked another Vercel CDN IP without using this mechanism,” Gauch wrote on Sunday.

Why LaLiga apparently chose to disregard Vercel’s overtures isn’t clear. Having the ability to avoid collateral damage and then going in the opposite direction makes little sense.

“A soccer organization should *not* have the ability to broadly block internet infrastructure access to millions of Spanish customers across major internet service providers,” Gauch continued.

“CDN providers like Vercel front millions of mission-critical websites and applications behind the IPs being blocked. Even in the situation a block is required, it can be done on a hostname basis via TLS SNI, rather than IP.

“We’re closely monitoring the situation and continue to offer our assistance to LaLiga to minimize the blast radius of these blocks and help preserve free access to the internet in Spain.”

Targeting X and Vimeo

Documenting every site affected by LaLiga blocking would be a monumental task but a few stood out over the weekend as potentially significant. Given his stance on free speech, there’s a non-zero risk of Elon Musk taking issue with X IP addresses being blocked to prevent piracy.

That being said, at least one demand from the Indian government to suspend 8,000 X accounts may have demanded Musk’s undivided attention. Threats to arrest local staff aren’t to be taken lightly.

Unfortunately, the X account that revealed the existence of the threats was itself blocked in India on Friday .

Pressure builds on ISPs

When pirate site blocking begins in most countries, it falls to local ISPs to carry out the blocks. Since ISPs are the de facto point of complaint when customers’ internet connections develop a sudden ‘fault’, they tend to shoulder a bigger reputational risk than rightsholders.

The difference in Spain, in respect of the court order behind the mayhem of the last 90 days, has two parts. Most importantly, regardless of the existence of a court order, every time a CDN IP address is added to the list by an ISP, they are well aware of the collateral damage that’s likely to cause.

After initially denying anything was wrong, ISPs’ now mention the court order more quickly, with phrasing that implies that their hands are tied.

As mentioned earlier, when an X user told Movistar that Vimeo was inaccessible due to blocking, Movistar responded by shifting the blame to the court order.

Casually reporting the blocking of a NASDAQ-listed company is in itself unusual. Arguably, however,the bigger issue concerns the crucial role played by ISPs when LaLiga and Telefonica filed the original application.

Through deals with exclusive rights holder Telefonica, the ISPs sell LaLiga TV packages so had a vested interest in the order being passed. None of the ISPs challenged the application and the fact that they were all in agreement was one of the factors that led to the judge rubber-stamping the application.

In Movistar’s case, the content is indeed currently blocked on the platform due to a court order, but it’s a court order that it a) agreed to comply with, b) stands to benefit from, and c) was requested by owner Telefonica.

Meanwhile, LaLiga president Javier Tebas appears bullish on the role played by intermediaries in the war on piracy. In a recent interview with Argentinian news outlet Clarins, he put three tech companies on notice.

“Google, Cloudflare and to a lesser extent X (the former Twitter), are necessary participants for the crime to be consumed. LaLiga is not going to stop until they go to jail and I am very stubborn,” he warned.

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

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

For rightsholders, site blocking remains the go-to response in many cases. Until recently, the majority of blockades were implemented by consumer ISPs, but expanded legal efforts are now targeting standalone DNS resolvers.

Over the past year, courts in France , Italy , and Belgium have ordered OpenDNS, Cloudflare, and Google to alter their responses to certain DNS queries. Instead of leading visitors to the domains of pirate sites, the companies are required to intercept queries and redirect them elsewhere.

The main rationale for targeting public DNS resolvers is their growing use for bypassing blocking measures rolled out by Internet providers. However, the American tech companies now being targeted are not happy with the role of ‘Internet police’ and appeals of these orders are still pending.

OpenDNS Says Farewell

While these legal battles play out in court, the DNS resolvers still have to comply one way or another. This has resulted in different responses, with Cisco’s OpenDNS taking by far the most drastic action.

When OpenDNS was first ordered to block pirate sites in France, the company made a simple but drastic decision to leave the country entirely, effectively affecting all French users. Last week, it repeated this response in Belgium following a similar court order.

Instead of blocking access to more than 100 sports piracy sites, as the Belgian order requires, OpenDNS announced its departure; at least temporarily.

“Due to a court order in Belgium requiring the implementation of blocking measures to prevent access within Belgium to certain domains, the OpenDNS service is not currently available to users in Belgium,” the company said .

Cloudflare Complies Using ‘Alternate Mechanisms’

Not all DNS resolvers take such drastic measures. Cloudflare chooses to comply with court orders in its own way. Cloudflare DNS (1.1.1.1) users who try to access the targeted domains in countries where blocking orders are issued, see the following notice instead.

Interestingly, Cloudflare maintains in its transparency report that it is not blocking content through its public DNS resolver. Instead, it points out that it uses “alternate mechanisms”.

“Given the extraterritorial effect as well as the different global approaches to DNS-based blocking, Cloudflare […] identified alternate mechanisms to comply with relevant court orders. To date, Cloudflare has not blocked content through the 1.1.1.1 Public DNS Resolver,” the company writes.

The result for Cloudflare DNS users appears to be the same, however. Those who try to access the blocked domains in the applicable countries will be redirected to the HTTP 451 error.

The good news is that affected users are informed about the reason for this technical blockade via the Lumen Database . That doesn’t appear to be the case with Google.

Google’s DNS Blackout

After running tests in both Belgium and France, using various blocked domains, it’s clear that the targeted websites are no longer accessible through Google’s public DNS resolver (8.8.8.8). However, unlike Cloudflare, there is no notification whatsoever.

Instead, Google appears to simply refuse the DNS query, which means that the domain lookup is not linked to any IP address.

While this is effective in the sense that the pirate sites are no longer available, it’s not very transparent. Users who try to access the domains will simply see a browser error, which could be caused by various DNS issues.

Google’s basic response is not limited to the recent Belgian court order. We observed the same query refusal for domain names that were included in French blocking orders over the past several months.

Transparency is Paramount

While the different responses from DNS resolvers are interesting, Google’s approach doesn’t make blocking efforts more transparent. These orders are still relatively new, so it’s possible that the company is working on offering more transparency in the future, but currently it only adds to the confusion.

Google’s response also appears to go against the advice of the Belgian court, which required the DNS providers to redirect users to a dedicated page, presumably to provide further detail.

If these blocking orders are upheld by various courts, a more streamlined approach will be welcome. Interfering with DNS is a big step that can’t be taken lightly, so transparency is paramount. That’s relevant for the United States too, where a new site-blocking bill also proposes public DNS resolver blockades.

—

For context, a copy of the recent Belgian court order shared by Cloudflare is availableb here (pdf)

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

If making content available to the public to consume legally is the most effective anti-piracy measure, pre-release piracy should be the most damaging form of piracy, or at least the theory goes.

The logic seems solid. When movies leak online before their intended release date, pirate copies meet consumer demand in a market that officially shouldn’t exist. A unique product unavailable to buy being distributed illegally changes everything.

From the day of the leak until theatrical windows close and streaming services open their doors, pirates offer a product that technically does not exist, in an environment where legal competition doesn’t exist either. Whether a theatrical release or straight to streaming, pre-release piracy does not discriminate.

21,000 Liters of Blood Leak Online

Arguments that legal content should be made available sooner are par for the course, but when an official release is just around the corner, disrupting a launch with last-minute upheaval would make very little sense.

This was the nightmare scenario faced by horror movie The Substance in 2024 when the movie leaked just days after its US release and ahead of its debut in several European markets. Making matters worse, the quality of the copy leaked online was excellent , providing the type of ‘direct replacement’ the industry fears most.

This new setback arrived in the wake of concerns over the movie itself, which had already affected distribution plans.

According to a Kinotico interview with director Coralie Fargeat ( paywall ) , industry giant Universal had been expected to distribute The Substance , but that ran into trouble when the company developed a sudden bout of hemophobia. Reportedly triggered by the movie’s grand finale, which is unlikely to meet its match anytime soon, Universal’s sudden aversion to astonishing quantities of blood led to requests for Fargeat to come up with an alternative ending.

Fargeat’s refusal to compromise led to Universal walking away from distribution. Fortunately, the distribution of 21,000 liters of fake blood would still go ahead thanks to a deal with new distributor Mubi.

Then The Substance leaked online, in all its gory glory.

Coralie Fargeat: I didn’t expect it at all

“What’s happened on social media has been crazy. I didn’t expect it at all,” Fargeat admitted to Kinotico.

Word that The Substance had leaked online spread quickly, and in an explosion of memes the movie soon became a viral sensation.

“Of course, a director doesn’t like seeing her film on the internet while it’s in theaters. You want people to see it in theaters. It’s very difficult to escape that these days, no matter how hard someone tries to prevent it,” the director explained.

Yet in this case, the usual predictions of piracy leading to financial ruin were not only incorrect, they were turned comprehensively upside down. From a production budget of $18m, The Substance soon became Mubi’s highest-grossing film, generating an estimated $82 million at the box office.

“Those images they saw on social media made people even more eager to go to the theater and discover the film. They didn’t want to miss the experience of seeing it with people,” Fargeat revealed.

“Once you’ve finished your film and it’s released, the reality is that it belongs to the audience. They’re going to choose what they want to do with it. It has touched people’s hearts. There are things you can’t control, but the response online was incredible.”

The Substance undoubtedly has that je ne sais quoi in abundance, but which of its many qualities combined to transform a potentially catastrophic leak into a shot in the arm for cinema remains elusive. The director didn’t expect it, Universal obviously failed to spot it, and the millions who watched the movie may still have difficulty describing it.

But they certainly felt it, there’s little doubt about that.

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

On Tuesday, 52-year-old Grenier traveled from Aruba, an island off the coast of Venezuela, to Canada’s Montreal airport.

Law enforcement officers of the Sûreté du Québec (SQ – Quebec Provincial Police) escorted Grenier to the SQ police station in Shawinigan. Police had carried out an operation in February 2024 which targeted Grenier and several individuals linked to the current prosecution. Grenier, who was outside Canada at the time, avoided arrest and remained at large for more than a year.

Court Hears Allegations Concerning Signal Theft and Pirate IPTV

The warrant for Grenier’s arrest was issued as part of an investigation into the illegal acquisition and sale of TV channels distributed by Canada’s leading telecoms companies. Bell, Rogers, and Quebecor claimed their losses ran to several million Canadian dollars.

Grenier appeared at the Trois-Rivières courthouse on Wednesday. The prosecution alleges that devices supplied by Grenier provided customers with access to thousands of television channels, most if not all pirated, for a low subscription price of ~CAD$25.00 per month (US$18.00).

The authorities accuse Grenier of operating a company which in turn owned pirate IPTV service Arubox TV. As per our 2023 report , Grenier made no secret of his involvement in the IPTV market.

Grenier Advertising IPTV Boxes

Police say that Arubox TV and a linked service called Stocker IPTV provided thousands of customers, 7,000 in Quebec alone, with illegal access to more than 3,500 pirated TV channels.

Grenier faces ten charges linked to the theft of telecommunications services, including conspiracy, fraud, theft, and money laundering. The alleged offenses took place between June 2020 and February 2024, generating annual profits of at least CAD$2 million (US$14m) according to Sûreté du Québec estimates.

• Conspiracy to defraud Bell, Rogers and Quebecor
• Theft of telecommunications services
• Production of devices linked to illegal signal access
• Trafficking in devices linked to illegal signal access
• Sale of devices linked to illegal signal access
• Trafficking in property obtained by crime
• Theft of more than CAD$5,000
• Laundering proceeds of crime
• Transfer of money linked to crime in Canada with intent to conceal/convert
• Computer data ‘mischief’

Other charges concern alleged trafficking in the prescription drugs Sildenfil and Tadalafil.

Seven Co-Defendants

Grenier will remain in custody until his next court appearance. The prosecution argued against Grenier’s release and insisted that he should face trial by jury, rather than by judge alone. Grenier’s co-defendants, several of whom previously appeared in court following their arrests in 2024, have already opted for a trial by jury.

A total of seven people stand accused of various crimes in the same case.

Le Nouvelliste identifies the co-defendants as follows:

• Danick Rouleau, 39, of Saint-Eustache (alleged Stocker IPTV operator)
• Sarah-Maude Grenier, 25, of Brownsburg-Chatham
• Marie-Ève ​​Poliquin Karaguioules, 26, of Saint-Eustache
• Éric Laforge, 44, of Gatineau
• Daniel Perreault-Marcotte, 38, of Saint-Henri
• Patrick Cyr, 49, of Longueuil
• Christian Sabourin, 60, of Princeville

Are Customers at Risk of Prosecution?

While police have offered assurances that customers are not targets in the current criminal investigation, possession of a pirate device could be a criminal offense in its own right. Police are therefore advising affected customers to dispose of their pirate devices at recycling centers.

Pirate subscriptions make legal devices illegal

The IPTV services in question are known to have been installed on relative expensive Formuler set-top boxes. When fresh out of their packaging, these Android-based devices are perfectly legal; only the subsequent configuration for piracy purposes changes that.

A full and properly executed factory reset will remove the offending configuration, help the environment, and via legal apps installed from Google Play, provide access to legal streaming services.

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

Fmovies first appeared online in 2016 and rapidly escalated into a severe headache for Hollywood as an incredibly resilient pirate operation.

Despite early intelligence from the MPA ‘s anti-piracy arm, ACE, pinpointing the piracy ring to Vietnam, shutting down the operation required countless hours of enforcement work and significant diplomatic efforts .

This eventually paid off last year, when Fmovies and its various sister sites, good for more than 300 million monthly visits , started to crumble. A few weeks later, ACE formally confirmed that it helped Vietnamese authorities to shut down the world’s largest piracy ring.

“The takedown of Fmovies is a stunning victory for casts, crews, writers, directors, studios, and the creative community across the globe,” MPA CEO Charles Rivkin said at the time.

Fmovies Prosecution of Phan and Nguyen

The true scope of the takedown operation may never be revealed, but it was clear that getting to this point had not been easy. The same was true for the aftermath, including the prosecution in Vietnam of two Fmovies operators; the alleged mastermind Phan Thành Công, and accomplice Nguyen Tuan Anh.

According to local authorities, the defendants came up with the Fmovies plan in 2015, after meeting at Aptech vocational school. After their arrests, both men confessed in full to their involvement with the criminal piracy ring that reportedly generated around $400,000 in ad revenue over the years.

Follow-up paperwork revealed that Phan, the lead programmer and manager, took most of the spoils, leaving Nguyen, responsible for the sites’ content, with roughly 10% of the total profits.

With these confessions , subsequent convictions seemed almost certain. However, it now transpires that this didn’t provide the ending Hollywood had hoped for.

Fmovies Defendants Dodge Prison

While no new details concerning the prosecution have appeared this year, information published in a US Trade Representative (USTR) report suggested that the two Fmovies defendants were sentenced recently. Due to the slightly odd phrasing and limited detail, we were hesitant to report immediately, but after an inquiry to the MPA, we can now confirm that the information is correct.

Both Fmovies defendants received suspended prison sentences for their roles in the Fmovies piracy ring. This means that, similar to previous convictions in Vietnam, they won’t have to serve any prison time, provided that they don’t break the law going forward.

Sentencing details are not yet public, and it’s unknown whether the men are required to pay damages. The legal paperwork previously showed that they already repaid the financial “benefit” received from their crimes, which amounted to VND 406 million (approx. $15,900 total) for 30 films.

This relatively low amount, paired with the suspended sentences, must come as a disappointment to those who worked for several years to shut down the Fmovies piracy empire.

It also explains why the USTR urged Vietnam to seek prison sentences and higher monetary fines in piracy related cases going forward.

“In order to have a deterrent effect, Vietnam enforcement authorities should […] consider seeking prison sentences, monetary fines, and other criminal penalties at the higher levels that are available under Vietnamese law, in order to reflect the immense damage caused to copyright holders by these copyright infringement operations.”

Stunning Silence

The Fmovies case was watched closely by Hollywood and the U.S. authorities that also played a role in the crackdown. While the original websites remain offline today, the perceived leniency of the sentences will likely come as a major disappointment.

Thus far, there haven’t been any public statements on the sentencing; the silence speaks volumes. After securing a “stunning victory” that made headlines all over the world, the only convictions have passed quietly by.

To the best of our knowledge, the Vietnamese authorities haven’t publicly mentioned the prosecution’s outcome either. The only thing we know is that it took place more than a week ago, before the USTR report came out.

That same USTR report, which strongly urges Vietnam to take tougher action against remaining pirate sites and services, also indicates that this is a diplomatically sensitive subject. Paired with the disappointing outcome for rightsholders, this may explain the stunning silence.

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

As pirate IPTV services have continued to grow in recent years, TV broadcasters and distributors have intensified their efforts to combat piracy.

Pay TV provider DISH Network , in tandem with the International Broadcaster Coalition Against Piracy ( IBCAP ), has been particularly active on this front.

Last month, DISH filed a lawsuit against the as-yet unidentified operators of the popular ‘pirate’ streaming services Lemo TV and Kemo IPTV in a Texas federal court. This case remains pending, but is boosted by a new lawsuit targeting a hosting provider that’s allegedly linked to these and other pirate IPTV services.

DISH Sues Hosting Service Innetra

In a lawsuit filed at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California this week, DISH accuses the UK company ‘Innetra PC’ of aiding widespread copyright infringement, while largely ignoring takedown requests.

The complaint is based on evidence gathered by IBCAP. It alleges that Innetra provides essential server and network infrastructure that enables numerous “Pirate Services” to illegally stream copyrighted content to users in the United States. This includes 22 Arabic, Hindi, and Bangla language TV channels, for which DISH holds the U.S. transmission rights.

“The scale of the Pirate Services’ direct infringement of the Works is extensive. The Pirate Services that transmitted linear streams of the Channels that aired the Works often did so 24 hours per day and 7 days per week, in some cases for several years,” the complaint reads.

Hosting companies are not automatically liable for the actions of their customers. In this case, however, DISH notes that Innetra can’t rely on safe harbor protection as it allegedly failed to properly respond to copyright infringement notices.

“Innetra possessed the means to take simple measures to stop the infringement – such as removing or disabling the infringing streams or terminating the accounts of the Pirate Services due to their repeated infringement – yet Innetra refused to take such measures, choosing instead to continue profiting from the Pirate Services’ direct infringement.”

‘DMCA Notices Ignored’

While Innetra is incorporated in the UK, DISH alleges that the company targeted its services toward the United States as well. This includes references to the DMCA, which is the only copyright law mentioned on its website.

The complaint further notes that the hosting provider appealed to customers through its alleged noncompliance with DMCA takedown notices, which is a much sought after policy by prospective pirate customers.

“Innetra deliberately attracts streaming services that violate United States copyright law, such as the Pirates Services, by promoting a policy designed to shield customers from Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedowns, and by keeping infringing activities online,” DISH writes.

The rightsholder reportedly sent hundreds of infringement notices to the hosting company, identifying specific infringing activities, IP addresses, and URLs. It only received a response to one of these, with Innetra responding that it would not comply.

Drawing in Pirates

While copyright infringement is prohibited by Innetra’s acceptable use policy, DISH alleges that the reality was different. The TV company believes that the host’s alleged DMCA-ignore policy acted as a draw for pirate IPTV services

“[T]he Pirate Services were drawn to Innetra’s servers and network because it did not stop their infringement, and the Pirate Services perceived Innetra’s servers and network as a place where infringement of the Works was tolerated because Innetra advertised them as such and many other Pirate Services did just that.”

The legal paperwork includes a list of allegedly infringing services, URLS and IP addresses that were linked to Innetra’s infrastructure. These include the aforementioned Lemo TV and Kemo IPTV, as well as Honeybee, Xtremehd, and Caliptostreams.

There is no mention of a DMCA ignore policy on Innetra’s website, but the company’s FAQ mentions that it protects customers from illegitimate DMCA claims .

$25 Million in Damages

All in all, DISH holds Innetra liable for contributory and vicarious copyright infringement. The same applies to the company’s director, Elna Paulette Belle, who is personally listed as a defendant in the case.

The lawsuit lists 171 copyrighted works and DISH requests the maximum statutory damages for all alleged infringement, bringing the potential damages to $25,650,000.

This isn’t the first time that DISH has targeted an intermediary in a piracy-related lawsuit. The company previously sued UK-based CDN company DataCamp, which eventually settled for $3 million . In addition, there’s a lawsuit pending against Ukrainian hosting provider Virtual Systems .

Responding to the lawsuit, IBCAP boss Chris Kuelling says that the legal efforts underscore its commitment to hold non-compliant CDNs and hosting providers accountable. At the same time, he issues a stark warning to other companies in the same business.

“Innetra blatantly disregarded IBCAP’s notices to its detriment – if you are a hosting provider or CDN and disregard our repeated notices, there is a strong chance you will be sued for copyright infringement.”

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

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

President Trump’s announcement on Sunday revealed his plan to save the U.S. movie industry, which according to him is “dying a very fast death.” The solution is tariff-based and most likely damaging to the major Hollywood studios.

Some media reports said the industry had been expecting the announcement. Others described the news sending shockwaves through Hollywood. The bottom line is President Trump’s belief that to prevent the movie industry’s imminent death, “any and all” movies produced in “foreign lands” will be subjected to a 100% tariff.

‘WE WANT MOVIES MADE IN AMERICA, AGAIN!’

In his Truth Social post, Trump blames the apparent demise of the industry on unspecified countries “offering all sorts of incentives” to draw filmmakers away from producing movies in the United States.

“Hollywood, and many other areas within the U.S.A., are being devastated. This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat,” he wrote.

“It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda!”

The job of instituting the 100% tariff falls to the Department of Commerce and the United States Trade Representative. Hollywood works closely with the latter when reporting overseas intellectual property threats and other barriers to business; in which report local tariffs are addressed remains to be seen.

ITIF: Here’s a Better Idea

The Motion Picture Association is yet to publish an official response to Trump’s rescue plan on its website but an organization that often shares the MPA’s views published a response on Tuesday.

Washington-based Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) describes itself as the world’s leading think tank for science and technology policy. For the last few years ITIF has been closely aligned with Hollywood on the need for new legislation to counter online piracy in the United States.

Rodrigo Balbontin, associate director for trade, IP, and digital technology governance at ITIF, begins with a general cautionary statement concerning retaliatory measures.

“Tariffs on foreign movies will be the first measure to impose unprecedented tariffs on services. Thanks to its digital economy, the United States has a global trade surplus on services, including films and TV, and America’s top companies export digital services. Expanding the trade war to the digital service sector will create a retaliation risk to one of the United States’s unique advantages: American creativity, innovations, and specialized knowledge,” Balbontin’s response reads .

ITIF then suggests an alternative to the imposition of tariffs on foreign produced movies. The president should back legislation that aims to prevent foreign pirate sites from having free access to consumers in the United States, who they supply with pirated American-owned content, without the owners of that content receiving compensation from anyone.

Instead of tariffs, the Trump administration can protect America’s film industry by reinforcing copyright protection. For example, Trump’s administration should call for Congress to pass legislation to block foreign piracy websites that hurt U.S. creative industries.

This is a proven measure, authorized by at least 50 countries, that reduces piracy, increases legal content consumption, and safeguards America’s creative industry from theft.

Without considering the merits of tariffs, site-blocking in general, or the detail of the FADPA proposal , a broad view may conclude that they all share the common objective of protecting the U.S. movie industry.

Unfortunately, these approaches address different problems. While encouraging inward investment appears to be the main objective of tariffs, not even the total elimination of piracy by site blocking would prevent filmmakers from embracing financial packages unavailable on home soil.

Are Foreign Incentives Damaging the U.S. Movie Industry?

President Trump claims that foreign incentives are damaging, but whether the industry agrees is a different matter. Companies in the movie business have collectively benefited from various tax-linked schemes to the tune of billions of pounds in the UK alone. The system was overhauled recently but under the previous scheme providing FTR (Film Tax Relief), official government figures show payments growing in recent years.

The new Audio-Visual Expenditure Credit (AVEC) provides companies with a tax credit worth 34% of their UK production costs on a film or high-end TV program. A credit worth 39% of UK production costs applies to animation or children’s TV shows.

Starting April 1, 2025, companies producing film and high-end TV shows could also claim back 39% of their UK visual effects costs. Films with budgets of £15 million or less became eligible for an enhanced rate of 53%.

‘Trump Should Demand Strong IP Protection in Tariff Negotiations’

With countries all around the world reportedly negotiating with the Trump administration for better deals than those imposed on them recently, ITIF suggests that this could provide an opportunity to demand stronger protection for IP rights.

“The Trump administration should insist on stronger intellectual property protections, including copyright, with the countries that are now negotiating over the Trump tariffs,” ITIF’s response reads.

One only has to read the various reports compiled by the USTR to see that certain countries are considered problematic, with some showing little improvement year after year. Yet viewed through the prism of countries supposedly playing the role of Pied Piper, luring U.S. companies with promises of free cash, better IP protection isn’t really an issue.

Examples highlighted by industry specialists Entertainment Partners reveal that countries with lacking IP protection aren’t usually among those offering the best incentives. Terms and conditions vary but the incentives include:

• Ireland: 40% credit for indy films, 90% up front (effectively an interest-free loan ).
• Portugal: 30% cash refund to productions worth €2.5m+
• Spain: federal rebates of 25%-30%, regional schemes; 45%-50% rebate (Canary Islands) and 35%-70% tax credits (Basque region)
• Japan: cash rebate of up to 50% of qualifying production costs, capped at $6.7 million
• Saudi Arabia: 40% incentive
• India: 40% of production costs reimbursed

What happens next is anyone’s guess, which in itself could deter future investment, both at home and overseas.

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