The Pirate Bay

The Pirate Bay (TPB) is een Zweedse website die BitTorrent bestanden indexeert. Het hanteert de slogan „The world's most resilient Bittorrent site” („De meest veerkrachtige Bittorrent site ter wereld”).¹⁾ De website is volgens Alexa Internet sinds 2008 nr. 89 van de meest populaire website in de wereld en de nr. 19 in Zweden.²⁾ Volgens de Zweedse anti-copyright organisatie Piratbyrån is The Pirate Bay een langdurig kunstproject.^{3) 4)} De website wordt voornamelijk bekostigd door middel van advertenties die verschijnen naast de zoekresultaten.

The Pirate Bay werd oorspronkelijk opgericht in november 2003 door de Piratbyrån (Het Piraterij Bureau). De website bestaat sinds oktober 2004 als een onafhankelijke organisatie. Oorspronkelijk werd de site geleid door Gottfrid Svartholm and Fredrik Neij, ook wel bekend als anakata en TiAMO. Zij zijn beiden aangeklaagd voor het „bijdragen aan het toegankelijk maken van auteursrechtelijk materiaal” als gevolg van hun werkzaamheden voor The Pirate Bay.

Op 31 maart 2006 werden de servers van de website bij een inval door de Zweedse politie offline gehaald voor de duur van 3 dagen. Volgens Los Angeles Times werd The Pirate Bay vanaf dat moment „de meest zichtbare partij die zich internationaal als anti-copyright en pro-filesharing profileerde”. ⁵⁾ Op 15 november 2008 kondigde The Pirate Bay aan dat het meer dan 25 miljoen unieke peers had.⁶⁾ Sinds december 2009 kent The Pirate Bay ook 4 miljoen geregistreerde leden, al is dit niet vereist om torrents te downloaden.⁷⁾

The Pirate Bay is verwikkeld in een aantal juridische conflicten, zowel als aanklager als verdediger. Op 17 april 2009 werden Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm and Carl Lundström schuldig bevonden aan het „bijdragen aan het toegankelijk maken van auteursrechtelijk materiaal” en veroordeeld tot één jaar gevangenisstraf en een boete van 30 miljoen Zweedse Kroon (€ 3.100.000,-), na een rechtzaak van 9 dagen. De leden van The Pirate Bay gingen echter in hoger beroep en beschuldigden de rechter van partijdigheid.⁸⁾ Op 26 november 2010 verkorte de rechter in het hoger beroep de gevangenisstraf, maar verhoogde deze de boete tot 46 miljoen Zweedse Kroon (€ 4.750.000,-)⁹⁾ Op 17 mei 2010 werd de site offline gehaald door een klacht bij de service provider van The Pirate Bay.¹⁰⁾ Desondanks was de site kort daarna weer online waarbij de klacht met veel hoon werd weggelachen. Op 23 juni 2010 hief de groep Piratbyrån zich op na het overlijden van Kopimi Botani, een prominent lid en één van de stichters van de groep.¹¹⁾

The Pirate Bay wordt gehost door PRQ, een Zweeds bedrijf dat in het bezit is van de eigenaars van The Pirate Bay, Gottfrid Svartholm and Fredrik Neij.¹²⁾ Van PRQ wordt gezegd dat deze „sterk beveiligde hosting diensten biedt zonder vragen te stellen aan diens klanten.”¹³⁾

Petter Nilsson, een kandidaat voor de Zweedse politieke reality show Toppkandidaterna (De Top Kandidaten), heeft 35.000 Zweedse Kroon (€ 3800,-) aan The Pirate Bay gedoneerd, wat is gebruikt om nieuwe servers aan te schaffen.¹⁴⁾ Sinds juni 2006 wordt de website gefinancierd door advertenities naast de zoekresultaten. Volgens speculaties van het Svenska Dagbladet (Zweedse Dagblad) generen de advertenties 600.000 Zweedse Kroon (€ 65.500,-) per maand.^{15) 16) 17)} Bij een politieonderzoek in 2006 concludeerde de politie dat The Pirate Bay 1.2 miljoen Zweedse Kroon (€ 131.500,-) per jaar aan advertenties verdiend.^{18) 19)} De aanklagers in de rechtzaak van 2009 kwamen aan de hand van e-mails en screenshots uit op 10 miljoen Zweedse Kroon (€ 1.095.000,-) per jaar uit,^{20) 21)} maar bij de aanklacht werd uiteindelijk de bedragen van het politie-onderzoek gehanteerd.^{22) 23)} De advocaten van de schatten de inkomsten van de site voor 2006 eerder rond de 725.000 Zweedse Kroon (€ 79.500,-)^{24) 25)} In het uiteindelijke oordeel van de rechtzaak viel men echter terug op de bedragen van het politie-onderzoek.²⁶⁾

Op 31 mei 2006 werd op bevel van de rechter Tomas Nordström een inval uitgevoerd tegen de website en mensen van The Pirate Bay. Deze rechter zou later ook voorzitten in de rechtzaak van 2009. Politie-agenten sloten de website af en confisqueerden de servers. In hun onbekwaamheid haalden zij tevens tientallen andere servers offline die door de service provider van The Pirate Bay, PRQ, werden gehost. Drie personen, Gottfrid Svartholm, Mikael Viborg, and Fredrik Neij werden aangehouden voor verhoor, maar werden later die avond in vrijheid gesteld.²⁷⁾ Alle servers werden bij deze inval in beslag genomen, inclusief die van Piratbyrån, een onafhankelijke organisatie die zich inzette voor de promotie van filesharing. Overige apparatuur zoals hardware routers, lege cd's en fax machines werden eveneens in beslag genomen. “The police officers were allowed access to the racks where the Pirate Bay servers and other servers are hosted. All servers in the racks were clearly marked as to which sites run on each. The police took down all servers in the racks, including the non-commercial site Piratbyrån.”

De Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) schreef in een persverklaring: „Since filing a criminal complaint in Sweden in November 2004, the film industry has worked vigorously with Swedish and U.S. government officials in Sweden to shut this illegal website down.” De MPAA kwam met deze legitimatie en claimde dat er drie arrestaties waren uitgevoerd. Dit was echter niet het geval, er was enkel sprake van ondervraging.

Na de inval vermelde de website van The Pirate Bay een bericht waarin opsporingsberichten voor inbreuk op auteursrechten of assistentie hierin werden getoond. Dit bericht stuitte op de nodige verwarring die werd veroorzaakt doordat op 1 april 2005 eenzelfde bericht bij wijze van grap werd getoond. De Piratbyrån zette een tijdelijke blog op om het publiek over de situatie te berichten.^{28) 29)}

Op 2 juni 2006, slechts 2 dagen na de inval was The Pirate Bay weer online en volledig operationeel. Voor de gelegendheid werd het Pirate Bay logo veranderd in een piratenschip dat naar het Hollywood logo schoot.³⁰⁾

Ter voorbereiding op de volgende inval heeft The Pirate Bay servers in zowel België en Rusland.³¹⁾ Volgens The Pirate Bay is het aantal geregistreerde leden sinds de inval alleen maar toegenomen tot 2.7 miljoen. Het aantal peers groeide met een factor 5 tot ruim 12 miljoen.³²⁾ De meest recente cijfers spreken echter al van 25 miljoen actieve gebruikers.

Het grootste techniekmuseum van Zweden, het Swedish National Museum of Science and Technology, heeft de in beslag genomen servers van 2009 in bezit gekregen en heeft het voor zijn symbolische waarde tentoongesteld, als zijnde zowel een „groot probleem en een grote kans”.^{33) 34)}

De P2P nieuwsblog Torrentfreak.com meldde op 12 oktober 2007 dat het internetdomein ipfi.com, dat voorheen toebehoorde aan de International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IPFI), een anti-filesharing organisatie, door The Pirate Bay was overgenomen. Bij navraag over hoe zij toegang tot dit domein verkregen hadden vertelde Peter Sunde aan TorrentFreak, „It's not a hack, someone just gave us the domain name. We have no idea how they got it, but it's ours and we're keeping it.” De website werd hernoemd tot „The International Federation of Pirates Interests.”³⁵⁾

In September 2007, a large number of internal emails were leaked from anti-piracy company MediaDefender by an anonymous hacker. Some of the leaked emails discussed hiring hackers to perform denial-of-service attacks (DDoS) on The Pirate Bay's servers and trackers.³⁶⁾ In response to the leak, The Pirate Bay filed charges in Sweden against MediaDefender clients Twentieth Century Fox Sweden AB, EMI Sweden AB, Universal Music Group Sweden AB, Universal Pictures Nordic AB, Paramount Home Entertainment (Sweden) AB, Atari Nordic AB, Activision Nordic, Ubisoft Sweden AB, Sony BMG Music Entertainment (Sweden) AB, and Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Nordic AB,³⁷⁾ but the charges were not pursued. MediaDefender's stocks fell sharply after this incident, and several media companies withdrew from the service after the company announced the leak had caused $825,000 in losses.³⁸⁾ Later, The Pirate Bay co-founder Peter Sunde accused police investigator Jim Keyzer of a conflict of interest when he declined to investigate MediaDefender. Keyzer later accepted a job for MPAA member studio Warner Brothers.^{39) 40)} The leaked emails revealed that other MPAA member studios hired MediaDefender to pollute The Pirate Bay's torrent database, contradicting the MPAA's earlier claim that its member studios were not MediaDefender clients.⁴¹⁾

The Swedish online business newspaper E24 Näringsliv reported on 15 February 2008 that the UK based anti-piracy firm Web Sheriff intended to file lawsuits in the United States and Sweden against The Pirate Bay on behalf of Prince, the Village People, Van Morrison, and the estate of Chet Baker. Lars Sandberg, Web Sheriff's local counsel in Sweden, told E24 that Web Sheriff had not yet determined whether to sue the individuals or the companies associated with the website. Peter Sunde dismissed the threats as relying on American law inapplicable in Sweden.^{42) 43)}

In an official letter to the Swedish Minister of Justice, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) requested assistance from the Swedish government to prevent video clips from the Beijing Olympics from being distributed via The Pirate Bay. The IOC claimed there were more than one million downloads of footage from the Olympics;— mostly of the opening ceremony. The Pirate Bay, however, did not take anything down, and temporarily renamed the website to The Beijing Bay.⁴⁴⁾

The trial against the men behind the Pirate Bay started in Sweden on 16 February 2009. They are accused of breaking Swedish copyright law.⁴⁵⁾ The defendants, however, continued to be confident about the outcome.⁴⁶⁾ Half the charges against the Pirate Bay were dropped on the second day of the trial.⁴⁷⁾

The three operators of the site and their one investor Carl Lundström were convicted in Stockholm district court on 17 April 2009 and sentenced to one year in jail each and a total of 30 million Swedish krona 2.7 million Euro in fines and damages.⁴⁸⁾ The defendants' lawyers have appealed to the Svea Court of Appeal and have requested a retrial in the district court, alleging bias on behalf of judge Tomas Norström,⁴⁹⁾ the same judge who ordered the 2006 raid. The case will likely be appealed to the Supreme Court of Sweden (and parts of the case may be remitted to the European Court of Justice), and thus the appeal process could take several years before a verdict is final.⁵⁰⁾ „Stay tuned for an exclusive interview with Peter Sunde aka brokep aka environmental politician. Our most lovely Bambuser Anna will do a live interview with Peter at 12 CET today. TV below, enjoy.”⁵¹⁾

On 13 May 2009 several record companies again sued Neij, Svartholm, Sunde and also The Pirate Bay's main internet service provider Black Internet. They required enforcement for ending The Pirate Bay's accessory to copyright infringement that had not stopped despite the court order in April, and in the complaint listed several pages of works being shared with the help of the site. The suit was joined by several major film companies on 30 July.^{52) 53)} The Stockholm district court ruled on 21 August that Black Internet must stop making available the specific works mentioned in the judgment, or face a 500,000 SEK fine.⁵⁴⁾. The company was notified of the order on 24 August, and they complied with it on the same day by disconnecting The Pirate Bay.⁵⁵⁾ Computer Sweden noted that the judgment did not order The Pirate Bay to be disconnected, but the ISP had no other option for stopping the activity on the site.⁵⁶⁾ It is the first time in Sweden for an ISP to be forced to stop providing access for a website.^{57) 58) 59)} A public support fund fronted by the CEO of the ISP was set up to cover the legal fees of an appeal.⁶⁰⁾ Pirate Party leader Rickard Falkvinge submitted the case for Parliamentary Ombudsman review, criticising the court's order to make intermediaries responsible for relayed content and to assign active crime prevention tasks to a private party.^{61) 62)}

The Stockholm district court ordered on 28 October 2009 a temporary injunction on Neij and Svartholm with a penalty of 500,000 SEK each, forbidding them from participating in the operation of The Pirate Bay's website or trackers.^{63) 64)}

The appeal court decided on 21 May 2010 not to change the orders on Black Internet or Neij and Svartholm.^{65) 66)}

The Pirate Bay trial was a joint criminal and civil prosecution in Sweden of four individuals charged for promoting the copyright infringement of others with The Pirate Bay site.^{67) 68)} The criminal charges were supported by a consortium of intellectual rights holders led by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry IFPI, who filed individual civil compensation claims against the owners of The Pirate Bay.⁶⁹⁾

Swedish prosecutors filed charges on 31 January 2008 against Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm, and Peter Sunde; and Carl Lundström, a Swedish businessman who through his businesses sold services to the site. The prosecutor claimed the four worked together to administer, host, and develop the site and thereby facilitated other people's breach of copyright law. Some 34 cases of copyright infringements were originally listed, of which 21 were related to music files, 9 to movies, and 4 to games. One case involving music files was later dropped by the copyright holder who made the file available again on The Pirate Bay site. In addition, claims for damages of 117 million Swedish krona (US$13 million) were filed.⁷⁰⁾ The case was decided jointly by a judge who was a member of several pro-copyright organisations and three appointed laymen. ^{71) 72)}

The trial started on 16 February 2009 in the district court of Stockholm in Sweden. The hearings ended on 3 March 2009 and the verdict was announced at 11:00 AM on Friday 17 April 2009: Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm and Carl Lundström were all found guilty and sentenced to serve one year in prison and pay a fine of 30 million Swedish krona (app. €2.7 million ). All the defendants have appealed the verdict.

The appeal trial concluded on October 15, 2010 ⁷³⁾ and the verdict was announced on November 26. The appeal court shortened sentences of three of the defendants who appeared in court that day. Neij's sentence was reduced to 10 months, Sunde's to eight, and Lundström's to four. However, the fine was increased from 32 to 46 million kronor.⁷⁴⁾

On 21 July 2009, the Amsterdam district court held a preliminary injunction hearing against the persons thought responsible for The Pirate Bay. The hearing followed a subpoena from the Dutch record industry trade association BREIN, who had an urgent complaint of intermediary copyright infringement. The defendants did not attend the hearing and hadn't arranged representation, so on 30 July 2009 the court entered an in absentia default judgement against them, accepting the complainants demands. It ruled that Neij, Kolmisoppi and Warg are „to stop and keep stopped the infringements on copyright and related rights of Stichting BREIN in the Netherlands within 9 August 2009, or face daily penalties of EUR 30,000, up to a maximum total of EUR 3,000,000. They were also ordered to pay the cost of the proceedings.^{75) 76) 77) 78)} In a separate case handled at the same time, the court ordered the same fines for the expected new owner of The Pirate Bay, Global Gaming Factory X, were it not to stop the copyright infringements after the site's takeover.⁷⁹⁾ According to BREIN director Tim Kuik, it is the first time a foreign website has been ordered to block access from the Netherlands.⁸⁰⁾ The BREIN however waived the payment of damages for August and allowed the site to stay online until its expected change of owners at the end of August 2009.^{81) 82)}

On 2 October 2009, The Pirate Bay's hosting services moved to Ukraine and their traffic was routed through The Netherlands, but BREIN contacted the ISP NForce and service was stopped. In return, The Pirate Bay moved their hosting location to a nuclear bunker owned by CyberBunker just outside Kloetinge in the south of the Netherlands.⁸³⁾

After The Pirate Bay introduced a feature in March 2009 to easily share links to torrents on the popular social networking site Facebook, Wired found in May that Facebook had started blocking the links. On further inspection, they discovered that all messages containing links to The Pirate Bay in both public and in private messages, regardless of content, were being blocked. Electronic Frontier Foundation lawyers commented that Facebook might be working against the US Electronic Communications Privacy Act by intercepting user messages., Facebook chief privacy officer Chris Kelly said that they have the right to use blocks on links where there is a „demonstrated disregard for intellectual property rights”. Links to other similar sites have not been blocked.^{84) 85) 86)}

The Pirate Bay is featured in Steal This Film (2006), a documentary series about society and filesharing, produced by The League of Noble Peers and also in the Danish Documentary Good Copy Bad Copy, which explores the issues surrounding file copyright. The Pirate Bay has been a topic on the nationally syndicated NPR radio show On The Media.^{87) 88)}

Björn Ulvaeus, former member of the Swedish pop music group ABBA, criticised copyright infringing activities of The Pirate Bay supporters as „lazy and mean”.^{89) 90)} In contrast, bestselling author Paulo Coelho has embraced free sharing online. Coelho supports The Pirate Bay and offered to be a witness in the 2009 trial. He accounts much of his growing sales to his work shared on the Internet and comments that „a person who does not share is not only selfish, but bitter and alone.”^{91) 92) 93)}

There are three major pirate organisations in Sweden: the political Pirate Party, which won 7.1 % of the Swedish votes⁹⁴⁾ and two seats in the 2009 European Parliament election⁹⁵⁾ , the Non-governmental organisation Piratbyrån, and the BitTorrent tracker The Pirate Bay. Of these three, Piratbyrån and The Pirate Bay share a common history but are now separate. Even though the Pirate Party started hosting The Pirate Bay on May 18, 2010,⁹⁶⁾ the Pirate Party developed on a completely separate though parallel track and is unrelated to the other two.

• De officiële website van The Pirate Bay.

• Letter from John G. Malcolm, Executive Vice President of the MPA, to the former State Secretary, Dan Eliasson - (17-03-2006).
• Response from Dan Eliasson - (10-04-2006).
• The Swedish Government's "orders" to the authorities - (02-03-2006).
• Håkan Roswalls (prosecutor) memo - (30-11-2005).

• The views from The Pirate Bay - (30-11-2007).
• TPBAFK: The Pirate Bay Away From Keyboard - (22-04-2009).