It was a bad day for FMovies, which was described as “The world's largest pirate broadcast.” The Creative and Entertainment Alliance took strict action against the piracy site with the help of Hanoi police to shut down FMovies and its affiliated sites forever.
According to Variety, ACE worked with Hanoi police and Vietnamese law enforcement agencies to take down FMovies and other streaming sites involved in illegal piracy activities. Other sites caught include bflixz, flixtorz, movies7, myflixer, and aniwave, which attracted more than 6.7 billion visits between January 2023 and June 2024, according to the findings of the Creative and Entertainment Alliance.
The FMovies raid also resulted in the arrest of two men.
FMovies was based in Vietnam, and the operation resulted in the arrest of two Vietnamese men by Hanoi authorities for their connection to the site. Vidsrc.to and any sites associated with the video hosting provider were also shut down. The Vietnamese men have not yet been charged, but Charles Rivkin, chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association and chairman of the ACE board, said the actions taken against the sites were, “An incredible victory for the cast, crew, writers, directors, studios and creative community around the world.” Larissa Knapp, Executive Vice President and Chief Content Protection Officer at MPA, said:
“We look forward to continued joint efforts with Vietnamese authorities, U.S. Homeland Security Investigations, and the U.S. Department of Justice’s International Property Program to bring these criminal operators to justice.”
ACE has governing members from Netflix, Walt Disney Studios, Amazon, and Apple TV+ and their primary mission is to combat online piracy of their content. ACE works domestically and globally through law enforcement and takes action through litigation when piracy is detected. FMovies has been under the MPA’s radar for some time, which also put it in ACE’s crosshairs.
FMovies is known for hosting recently released movies and TV shows, making it easy for individuals to stream content online. In a somewhat bold move considering the illegal practices, FMovies’ slogan is, “Best place to watch movies online for free.” According to Rivkin, FMovies had many domains, making it difficult to ensure that everything was removed, but this latest arrest likely means the official end of the illegal streaming platform.
According to Rivkin, piracy services have been in steep decline since at least 2017, when he first joined the MPA. At the start of his tenure, there were 1,444 pirate IPTV services in North America, but that has dropped to just 220 this year. He called this latest victory a major one. “A real turning point” Rifkin added:“Our battle is not over yet and may never be over, but I believe we are winning.”
Source: Variety
