BREIN, MPAA pirate site pull-down
January 28, 2011
Dutch anti-piracy body BREIN has teamed up with the Motion Picture Association of America to take down a further 12 US websites it accuses of offering links to illegally downloadable material. The move follows action taken towards the end of 2010 to close 29 such sites. Earlier this month, it shut down 39 sites in the Netherlands for the MPAA, as well.
The pair filed copyright violation complaints with the sites’ hosting providers. The specific URLs are not being released because frequently the affected sites will spring up elsewhere online with a slightly modified name. BREIN says that releasing the names of the sites would make it much easier for users to find their new URLs in the future.
The initiative follows steps taken by the US Department of Homeland Security in November 2010 that resulted in over 70 sites being shut.
BREIN’s director, Tim Kuik, admitted that there would be new sites emerging, “but we take them down fast so they cannot grow,” he claimed.