MPAA, RIAA Laud DOJ for Shutting Down Top BitTorrent Website

MPAA and RIAA lauded DOJ for shutting down No. 1 BitTorrent site Kickass Torrents (KAT). The website is believed to have distributed more than $1 billion worth of pirated media and drew in more than 50 million unique visitors per month before its shuttering, DOJ said. The department acted Wednesday to seize seven domain names and one bank account associated with KAT, while simultaneously filing a criminal complaint in U.S. District Court in Chicago against Artem Vaulin on allegations he owned and operated the website. Vaulin was arrested in Poland and faces four charges in the U.S. -- two counts of criminal copyright infringement and one count each of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement and conspiracy to commit money laundering. “In an effort to evade law enforcement, Vaulin allegedly relied on servers located in countries around the world and moved his domains due to repeated seizures and civil lawsuits,” said Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell in a news release. “His arrest in Poland, however, demonstrates again that cybercriminals can run, but they cannot hide from justice.” Websites like KAT “brazenly facilitate all kinds of illegal commerce,” said IRS Criminal Investigation Chief Richard Weber in the news release. “In a music industry that depends upon legal digital distribution platforms for the majority of its revenues, targeted criminal actions play an important role in protecting the ability of creators to earn a living,” said RIAA CEO Cary Sherman in a statement. “This case shows that individuals who use the veil of anonymity of the Internet to make a business of preying upon the creative industries are not beyond the reach of the law.” MPAA believes “this criminal case is a major step to reduce illegal theft of creative content by large-scale piracy sites,” said CEO Chris Dodd in a statement.