United States Hosts Most Pirate Sites, UK Crime Report Finds

[Crypto]

The latest UK IP Crime Report reveals that significant progress is being made in the fight against online piracy but still many challenges remain. One of the main problems traces back to U.S. hosting companies, who according to the report give shelter to most of the investigated pirate sites.

 

 

The latest UK IP Crime Report reveals that significant progress is being made in the fight against online piracy but still many challenges remain. One of the main problems traces back to U.S. hosting companies, who according to the report give shelter to most of the investigated pirate sites.

 

 

The figure above comes as a bit of a surprise, as one would expect that United States authorities and industry groups would have been keeping their own houses in order. 

 

Just a few months ago the US-based IIPA, which includes MPAA and RIAA as members, called out Canada because local hosting providers are “a magnet†for pirate sites. However, it now appears they have still plenty of work to do inside U.S. borders.

 

But even when hosting companies are responsive to complaints from rightsholders the problem doesn’t always go away. The report mentions that most sites simply move on to another host, and continue business as usual there. 

 

“In 2013, FACT closed a website after approaching the hosting provider on 63 occasions. Although this can be a very effective strategy, in most instances the website is swiftly transferred onto servers owned by another ISP, often located outside the UK.â€

 

While downtime may indeed be relatively brief the report claims that it may still hurt the site, as visitors may move on to other legitimate or illegitimate sources. 

 

“The [moving] process usually involves a disruptive period of time whereby the website is offline, during which users will often find an alternative service, thus negatively affecting the website’s popularity.†

 

While hosting companies remain a main target, tackling the online piracy problem requires a multi-layered approach according to the UK Crime Group. 

 

 

 

With the help of local law enforcement groups such as City of London’s PIPCU, copyright holders have rolled out a variety of anti-piracy measures in recent months. This includes domain name suspensions, cutting off payment processors and ad revenue, website blocking by ISPs and criminal prosecutions.

 

These and other efforts are expected to continue during the years to come. Whether that will be enough to put a real dent in piracy rates has yet to be seen.

 

 

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