UK-based TV torrent site TheBox.bz has decided to close before it’s targeted by anti-piracy enforcers.
The site, which shares British TV shows, will close down its servers on September 1 but keep its busy forums open for ‘a while longer’.
It’s the first site to close down pre-emptively in the face of increasing civil action via ISPs to make file-sharing more difficult for users.
Read Recombu Digital’s guide to UK ISPs blocking file-sharing sitesThe site’s operators told file-sharing news website TorrentFreak: “The decision to retire the site was not in response to any specific threat, but it is in reaction to the rapidly changing and increasingly hostile political climate we find ourselves in. We feel that being proactive and closing the doors is the most prudent move.”
Final closedown of the box’s community forums and private messages will involve securely wiping all account details, the operators have promised.
TheBox is private site with more than 90,000 members, who have uploaded more than 110,000 torrents since it launched in 2007.
September will see the launch of the British police’s new Intellectual Property Crime Unit, under the City of London police service.
The new unit will target file-sharing sites which provide conduct piracy for ‘criminal gain’, cooperating with film, TV and recording industry bodies such as FACT and the BPI.
It’s likely to result in criminal prosecutions against the operators of file-sharing sites, in addition to helping with civil actions against both sites and potentially their users to recover lost revenue, and the ongoing use of court orders forcing ISPs to block sites.
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