Piracy hasn\u2019t gone away, but visible legal action against traditional pirate adversaries has been minimal, at least when compared to the periods when revenue was headed in the opposite direction.<\/p>\n
Increased Threat, Unfinished Business<\/h2>\n
IFPI\u2019s reporting in 2019 was upbeat; piracy had\u00a0fallen dramatically<\/a>\u00a0and music consumption was on the up. Yet a relatively new form of consumption was already causing alarm and was soon described as a\u00a0greater threat<\/a>\u00a0than pirate sites.<\/p>\n So-called stream-ripping was nothing new, but when fueled by the massive repository of recorded music on YouTube, the preferred tactic of shutting down the source was effectively obsolete. So, continuing along lines similar to those that had\u00a0shuttered YouTube-MP3<\/a>\u00a0in 2017, the industry took what action it could against sites that converted YouTube links into MP3 downloads.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n One of the most notable disputes saw the RIAA take on the Russian owner of 2conv.com and FLVTO.biz. In an ideal world, the\u00a0$83 million judgment<\/a>\u00a0in the labels\u2019 favor back in 2022 would\u2019ve dampened enthusiasm among those tempted by the same line of business. Ongoing streaming-ripping complaints in the RIAA\u2019s annual reports to the USTR suggested minimal deterrent effect.<\/p>\n In an announcement Tuesday, IFPI confirmed that one of the most persistent threats with the greatest volume of online traffic, has now been shut down.<\/p>\n Y2Mate.com had been featured in the RIAA\u2019s reports to the USTR for several years, and while its traffic had shown signs of decline more recently, 620 million visits per year between Y2Mate and eleven other sites (under common ownership), is clearly significant.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cY2mate has been subject to website\u00a0blocking actions<\/a>\u00a0in 13 countries and has appeared in numerous editions of the USTR Notorious Markets Report and the EU Counterfeit and Piracy Watchlist. The shutdown of the sites is a result of targeted enforcement action by IFPI against the operator of the sites,\u201d IFPI reported.<\/p>\n \u201cThe operator of Y2mate and the other 11 websites agreed to shut down the sites for good and to stop infringing IFPI\u2019s members rights in the future. Most of the domains are now in IFPI\u2019s possession, including Y2mate.com, Yt1s.com, Utomp3.com, Tomp3.cc, and Y2mate.gg.\u201d<\/p>\n Other than an agreement to shut down and a promise not to infringe IFPI\u2019s members\u2019 rights in the future, IFPI\u2019s announcement offers no further detail on the agreement or the assumed change in circumstances that led to it. It\u2019s reasonable to assume that domains were handed over as part of a deal, however.<\/p>\n The full list of domains is available below. Records suggest that several were updated recently, with at least one currently displaying the message below.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Given the record industry\u2019s complaints over registrant details being hidden away, it\u2019s somewhat ironic that most of the domains have WHOIS records displaying \u2018Withheld for Privacy\u2019. That being said, there are more significant gaps in the information being made available. The absence of a lawsuit is unusual; the lack of a large settlement amount, even more so.<\/p>\n Considering that IFPI\u2019s multi-year mission to shut down Y2Mate led them to Vietnam, and despite the chances of obtaining anything close to a deterrent custodial sentence being close to minimal, IFPI still managed to obtain the sites\u2019 domain names.<\/p>\n In theory, this should make it more difficult to relaunch the sites, but in practical terms, Y2Mate has been evading site blocking measures for years and is unlikely to consider the loss of a few domains as especially problematic. Nevertheless, control of the domains means millions of eyes on the shutdown notice and any benefits that might bring.<\/p>\n None of this means that the return of the sites is inevitable. Yet, if that was the chosen path, preventing it would be almost impossible. Enforcement with lasting results remains elusive in Vietnam, and sites like these can be launched, torn down, and relaunched in the time it takes to eat a sandwich.<\/p>\n The full list of websites shut down by IFPI:<\/em><\/p>\n 9convert.com Source: \u00a0![\"\"](\"https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/youtmp3.png\")
<\/center> <\/p>\nY2Mate and Eleven Similar Sites Call it Quits<\/h2>\n
![\"y2mate-1\"](\"https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/y2mate-1.png.webp)
<\/picture><\/center> <\/p>\nFiner Details Go Unmentioned<\/h2>\n
![\"ifpi](\"https:\/\/torrentfreak.com\/images\/ifpi-shutdown.png.webp)
<\/picture><\/center> <\/p>\nSites Operated From Vietnam<\/h2>\n
\nIn-y2mate.com
\nTomp3.cc
\nUmp3.cc
\nutomp3.com
\ny2mate.gg
\nyt1s.gg
\nyoutubepp.com
\ny2mate.com
\nyt1s.com
\nvidcombo.com
\nY2mates.com<\/em><\/p>\n![\"TorrentFreak\"](\"http:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/torrentfreak.png\")
<\/a> TorrentFreak.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"