Torrent sites go offline as police raid alleged copyright infringers

Swedish police raided the hosting company PRQ today, taking four servers and possibly dozens of file-sharing sites offline. According to a report by TorrentFreak, sites taken offline include torrent sites torrenthound.com, linkomanija.net, and tankafetast.nu, several sports streaming sites, and at least two private BitTorrent sites.

PRQ is owned by founders of the Pirate Bay, and was the target of a 2006 raid that took the Pirate Bay website offline due to copyright infringement allegations. Coincidentally, the Pirate Bay also went offline today. But this was apparently unrelated to the PRQ raid, as Pirate Bay no longer relies on PRQ for hosting. The Pirate Bay said on Facebook that it is suffering through a power outage. "We have not been raided. We are not shutting down. We like turtles, waffles, and you," the Pirate Bay said.

PRQ confirmed today's raid. The outlet has a long list of controversial clients including WikiLeaks and the North American Man-Boy Love Association, according to a Forbes article. But the websites taken offline by the raid seem to be restricted to file sharing and streaming sites, plus PRQ's own site.

PRQ owner Mikael Viborg described the raid in an interview with Swedish news site Nyheter24, saying the police seized four servers, and that the raid was the first on the company since 2010.

 

 

Message from Anonymous # OpPirateBay