10 European Nations, Europol & More Take Down World’s Largest Piracy Network

Recently, we reported about a major crackdown on global digital piracy.

This included Indian OTT giant Zee Entertainment Enterprises (ZEEL) securing an order from the Delhi High Court to pull down websites and platforms that are hosting its content illegally, as well as social networking site Telegram conveying its commitment to remove copyrighted material and illegal content from its platform.

Now, in a major move, law enforcement authorities from 10 European countries along with Europol, Eurojust, Audiovisual Anti-Piracy Alliance (AAPA), and @ON Network, have successfully executed an operation that took down one of the largest illegal streaming networks operating within and outside the EU.

According to a news release published on its website, Europol revealed that the operation included an investigation of 102 individuals suspected of distributing material from streaming services online illegally, including movies, series, and live sports.

The operation saw 11 arrests made, and 112 houses searched. Through this, at least 29 servers and 270 IPTV equipment/devices were seized and over 100 domains spreading pirated content were taken down.

These included sites that were pirating over 2,500 television channels to more than 22 million users, generating over €250 million ($262 million) in illegal revenue per month.

Furthermore, €1.6 million ($1.68 million) in cryptocurrency and €40,000 ($42,006) in cash were seized, along with various kinds of drugs and weapons.

However, the seized amounts represent only a fraction of the business, which is believed to generate around €3 billion ($3.15 billion) per year, as per a release by the AAPA.

At the same time, more than 560 resellers were identified.

Ahead of this, the authorities found the group indulged in other crimes such as money laundering and cybercrime, which are currently under investigation.

Participating countries included Bulgaria, Croatia, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.


Speaking about the operation, Mark Mulready, Co-president of AAPA, said, “We applaud the efforts of the Catania Public Prosecutor’s Office, the Croatian State Attorney Office for Suppression of Corruption and Organised Crime, Europol, Eurojust, and all of the law enforcement agencies involved in these operations.”

“The scale of these multi-jurisdictional law enforcement actions highlights the considerable challenge our industry faces when dealing with such sophisticated international pirate networks. We are proud to have collaborated with our law enforcement partners to provide technical training and in-field support to assist them in successfully tackling the world’s largest pirate network.”

“We are very grateful to the AAPA members who supported this action day, including Premier League, Sky Group, Nagravision, Deutsche Fußball Liga (DFL), beIN Sports, United Media, Friend MTS and Irdeto.”

“We will continue to closely collaborate with law enforcement agencies in Europe and beyond to enable them to successfully identify, investigate and prosecute large-scale cross-border pirate networks.”

While these countries, regulatory agencies, and technology companies have been making big moves to curb the spread of illegal streaming and pirated content, studies indicated that a large number of people are on the side of piracy—sometimes—according to some studies.

This trend isn’t restricted to digital piracy but also includes counterfeit or knock-off products. The sentiment for indulging in both kinds of piracy remains the same though—high costs involved in gaining access to the original product or legal channel.

Do you think this move will help reduce the spread of digital piracy or do you think pirates will find other ways to continue their illegal

Let us know in the comments below!