Torrent block shock as massive piracy crackdown applied for in courts

[Len]

PIRATE Bay fans have been put on alert after a massive piracy crackdown against torrent download sites was applied for in the courts.

The Pirate Bay could be affected by a major piracy crackdown which could see torrent download sites blocked for a massive amount of users.

The Pirate Bay is the world’s most popular torrent site, and for years has given users access to illegal downloads for popular movies and TV users.

In the past few days The Pirate Bay has been down for many users, who have experienced problems accessing it or finding it slow to load up.

The outage was the second this month, with the first downtime in November coinciding with fans of 1337x hit by issues accessing the rival torrent portal.

And users of The Pirate Bay could soon be hit with another blow as a major piracy crackdown is in the works.

Sky Network Television, with has no connection to the British satellite service of a similar same name, is the biggest pay-TV service in New Zealand.

They have filled a complaint with the country’s High Court demanding local Internet service providers block access to several ‘pirate’ sites.

These torrent sites have not been named but, as TorrentFreak reported, it seems likely The Pirate Bay could be present in this list of websites.

The ISPs named in the complaint control around 90 per cent of the internet market in New Zealand, so any injunction will affect almost the entire country.

Sky in their application said pirate sites infringe copyright and undermine their business model by making available unauthorised copies of pieces of entertainment.

The response from one of the New Zealand ISPs called on in the complaint, Vocus Group, has been strong.

Taryn Hamilton, the Consumer General Manager for Vocus, said: “SKY’s call that sites be blacklisted on their say so is dinosaur behaviour, something you would expect in North Korea, not in New Zealand.

“It isn’t our job to police the Internet and it sure as hell isn’t SKY’s either, all sites should be equal and open.”

In response, SKY said: “Pirate sites like Pirate Bay make no contribution to the development of content, but rather just steal it.

“Over 40 countries around the world have put in place laws to block such sites, and we’re looking to do the same.”

If the High Court does side with SKY, it would have a huge impact on the number of users that can reach The Pirate Bay.

However InternetNZ, a non-profit organisation dedicated to “protecting and promoting the Internet for New Zealand”, have their doubts.

They said such a widespread block should only happen following a parliamentary mandate.

The news comes as torrent sites have been left fearing the impact from the upcoming Google Chrome ad blocker.

Chrome is the world’s most popular browser, and the leading browser for many torrent websites.

The upcoming ad blocker, set to launch next year, is expected to have a big effect on torrent sites and the revenue they bring in.

Adverts that will be affected are those which don’t fall within the “better ads standards” including pop-up ads.

The owner of one torrent site, who did not want to be named, said the Google Chrome ad blocker could signal the end of torrents.

They said: “The torrent site economy is in a bad state. Profits are very low. Profits are f***** compared to previous years.

“Chrome’s ad-blocker will kill torrent sites. If they don’t at least cover their costs, no one is going to use money out of his pocket to keep them alive.

“I won’t be able to do so at least.”

Popular torrent websites like Kickass Torrents, ExtraTorrent and Torrentz.eu have all shut down as the crackdown against online piracy intensifies.

The penalties for online piracy have also become more severe this year thanks to the Digital Economy Act becoming law.

The new law raised the maximum possible sentence for online copyright infringement offences from two to 10 years.

The maximum sentence will only apply to people who commit serious copyright crimes, such as distributing content.