Feds charge Russians linked to the 'world's largest' pirated e-book library

J. Fingas@jonfingasNovember 17, 2022 4:44 PMIn this report: Justice Department, news, gear, criminal offense, copyright, piracy, Russia, e-guides@felipepelaquim on Unsplash

US law enforcement just isn’t just intrigued in shutting down online video pirates. The feds have charged two Russian nationals, Anton Napolsky and Valeriia Ermakova, for allegedly running the pirate e-ebook repository Z-Library. The website was billed as the “world’s greatest library” and held above 11 million titles, lots of of which ended up bootleg versions stripped of copyright protections.

The pair was arrested in Cordoba, Argentina at the US’ request on November 3rd. The American federal government disabled and seized the community Z-Library website at the same time. Napolsky and Ermakova each individual face fees of copyright infringement, cash laundering and wire fraud.

As TorrentFreak clarifies, it’s not distinct how central Ermakova and Napolsky ended up to Z-Library. Though the indictments only include action setting up in January 2018, FBI Assistant Director-in-Cost Michael Driscoll explained the two had been working a pirate web-site for “about a ten years.” Z-Library is even now accessible on the dark web and responding to email.

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The pirate bookshelf’s social media existence contributed to its undoing. Ars Technica notes The Authors Guild complained to the Place of work of the United States Trade Representative after a “#zlibrary” hashtag started out trending on TikTok, with around 19 million sights. College students and other people ended up touting Z-Library as a way to get textbooks and other class content for free of charge.

As with several pirate site shutdowns, this isn’t really likely to be a long lasting blow. The Authors Guild pointed to possibilities like Libgen when it filed its complaint, and Z-Library by itself is carrying on in a constrained kind. It really is a higher-profile victory for the anti-piracy camp, nevertheless, and implies that other digital e book pirates could experience related lawful action.

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