TPB is an online repository for digital entertainment media, and other software content. It is also known as The Pirate Bay. Piratbyrn, a Swedish company that created the Pirate Bay in 2003. It allows users search, download, and share torrent files. This allows peer-to-peer file sharing between BitTorrent protocol users.
The Pirate Bay has been a catalyst for debate and discussion on the legal aspects of file sharing, copyright, and civil liberties. It is also a platform for political initiatives against existing intellectual property laws and a key figure within anti-copyright movements.
The website was forced to relocate to multiple addresses after it was shut down and multiple domain seizures.
Fredrik Neij, Peter Sunde and the creators of the website were found guilty in April 2009 for copyright infringement. They were sentenced in April 2009 to one year imprisonment and a fine. Many internet service providers (ISPs) blocked the website in several countries. Access was allowed via proxy websites. Svartholm, Neij and Neij were both released after serving shorter sentences. Sunde was also released.
Histories
In September 2003, the Pirate Bay was founded by the Piracy Bureau, an anticopyright Swedish organization. It has been an independent entity since October 2004. The Pirate Bay was first managed by Fredrik Neij, and Gottfrid Strvartholm (also known as anakata). The Motion Picture Association of America accused them of “assisting in making copiedrighted info accessible.” They raided the Stockholm servers of the Pirate Bay website on May 31, 2006. Three days of inaccessibility followed. Pirate Bay claims to be a non-profit organization with its headquarters in Seychelles. However, this claim isn’t supported.
The Pirate Bay was both named as a plaintiff and defendant in a number of lawsuits. Following a nine-day trial, Fredrik Neij and Peter Sunde were found guilty of copyright violation assistance. They were sentenced for one year imprisonment and a fine of 30 million SEK (roughly, around 4.2 million USD, 2.8 million GBP, or 3.1 million EUR). The defendants appealed to the court, claiming that it had succumbed to political pressure. A Swedish appeals court confirmed the decision on November 26, 2010. The sentence was reduced to 46 million SEK. However, the fine was increased to 46 millions SEK. The site was taken down by an injunction against their broadband provider on May 17, 2010.
Website access was restored after a statement on the website mocking the injunction was posted. After the death of Ibi Kop Botani, a cofounder and important member of Piratbyrn, Piratbyrn was divided in June 2010.
PRQ, a Sweden-based business owned by Fredrik Neij, and Gottfrid Stvartholm hosted The Pirate Bay for many decades.
PRQ is said to offer “very secure, no-questions-asked” web hosting services. Serious Tubes Networks began offering network connectivity to The Pirate Bay in May 2011. The Pirate Bay added the category “Physibles” to its network connectivity on January 23, 2012. These 3D files are “data objects that can (and practically) become physical” when printed using a 3D printer.
Google’s Transparency Report was launched in May 2012. Over 6,000 people requested that Google remove Pirate Bay links. These requests included more than 80,500 URLs. Froytal Services LLC, Bang Bros and Bang Bros were top recipients (IFPI). PirateBrowser was released August 10, 2013 by Pirate Bay. This web browser is free and can bypass filtering. From 2003 to November 2014, the site was the most popular torrent directory. KickassTorrents received fewer visitors.
Google deleted all Google Play apps with “The Pirate Bay” in their titles from its app store on December 8, 2014.
On December 9, 2014, the Swedish authorities raided Pirate Bay. They took servers, computers, and other devices.
Other websites that were related to torrents, including EZTV and Zoink, were also closed. EZTV, which reportedly showed “signs of life” on the second day after the raid, was uploaded to ExtraTorrents and KickassTorrents. It was reported that eztvproxy.net had support for proxy sites via its backend IP addresses. Several replicas of The Pirate Bay were made online in the days that followed, including oldpiratebay.org, which was created by isoHunt.
A Swedish court took the Pirate Bay’s.se domain from them on May 19, 2015. Six additional domains were created by the site in response. On May 26, 2015, the site appealed against this decision. The appeal was dismissed by the Court on May 26, 2015. In May 2016, the site was redirected back to its original.org address. After KickassTorrents’ closure in August 2016, the Pirate Bay was once more the most popular BitTorrent website.
Per Gottfrid Svartholm Srang is a Swedish computer specialist who is best-known for co-owning PRQ hosting and founding BitTorrent site The Pirate Bay (alias Anakata).
This film contains excerpts from an interview Svartholm did about The Pirate Bay’s raid on May 2006. It features police officers. TPB AFK features him prominently.
Svartholm Warg is said to have worked with WikiLeaks in 2010 on Collateral Murder. This footage of the helicopter’s cockpit gunsight was captured during an American-led airstrike on Baghdad in July 2007. WikiLeaks claims Svartholm was an IT consultant responsible for critical infrastructure. Svartholm’s companies hosted WikiLeaks computers before.
He was arrested in Denmark on November 27th, 2013 and charged with hacking Danish driver’s license and social security databases. He was kept in isolation prison while he waited for his court appearance.
The jury sentenced him to three and a half years in prison on 31 October 2014. He challenged the sentence immediately. However, the judges decided that the sentence should remain in custody until the appeal court trial. They believed he might try to escape his punishment.
He was released from prison on September 29, 2015, after three years in various jails in Sweden and Denmark. He now works in IT.
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