Season seven of Game of Thrones has only just begun, and already HBO is cracking down on people illegally downloading the wildly popular TV series. But it's questionable how successful the TV network's attack will be, especially when many pirates are turning to streaming — a form of piracy that's hard to track but easy to do, even for Luddites.

The Daily Mail is one of the best known British tabloids, read by millions of people around the globe. The website regularly features viral videos, which can be quite entertaining, but according to a new lawsuit filed at a federal court in California, dozens are being used without permission.

'Pirate' sites Sci-Hub and LibGen have been ordered to pay millions of dollars in damages to Elsevier, one of the largest academic publishers. A New York District Court granted Elsevier's request for a default judgment of $15 million in damages. Sci-Hub's founder says that she can't pay the damages even if she wanted to, and for now, the "Pirate Bay for science" isn't going anywhere.

The European Court of Justice handed down a ruling against The Pirate Bay yesterday, one which could have implications far beyond the torrent site. Platforms such as Google and YouTube, which play an active role in the way content is presented, could be seriously affected, experts warn.

In 1701, in Middletown, New Jersey, Moses Butterworth languished in a jail, accused of piracy. Like many young men based in England or her colonies, he had joined a crew that sailed the Indian Oc

Remember, to hear the MPAA tell it, piracy is really killing the movie industry. It's been whining about piracy for basically my entire lifetime, and constantly predicting its own demise if "something" is not done. And, despite the fact that Congress has repeatedly obliged Hollywood in ratcheting up copyright anti-piracy laws and despite the fact that the MPAA has been clearly wrong repeatedly (such that the new technologies it feared actually helped expand Hollywood's business), the studios continue to...

'Pirate' sites Sci-Hub and LibGen face millions of dollars in damages in a lawsuit filed by Elsevier, one of the largest academic publishers. Elsevier has requested a default judgment of $15 million against the defendants for their "truly egregious conduct" and "staggering" infringement.

In a surprise move, ExtraTorrent decided to shut down today, for good. Users who access the site’s homepage are welcomed by a short but clear message, indicating that the popular torrent index will not return (the message appears intermittently). “ExtraTorrent has shut down permanently.” “ExtraTorrent with all mirrors goes offline.. We permanently erase all data. Stay away from fake ExtraTorrent websites and clones. Thx to all ET supporters and torrent community. ET was a place to be….”

Spotify is often credited as the music service most in tune with the 'pirate' mentality, having converted millions of former file-sharers in recent years. Interestingly, according to writer and researcher Rasmus Fleischer, a decade ago the site actually populated its beta with pirate MP3s, including some that were only available on The Pirate Bay.

John Deere has turned itself into the poster-child for the DMCA, fighting farmers who say they want to fix their own tractors and access their data by saying that doing so violates the 1998 law's prohibition on bypassing copyright locks.

Fansubbing—the unofficial creation of fan-made subtitles for TV shows and movies—is illegal, a Dutch court ruled this week. The Free Subtitles Foundation, after coming under fire from the Netherlands' anti-piracy association BREIN, decided to raise some money and take BREIN to court. The Foundation's lawyer told TorrentFreak that the lawsuit sought to clarify whether the creators of a TV show or movie can reserve the right to create and distribute subtitles.

Today we bring you the next episode of the Steal This Show podcast, discussing renegade media and the latest file-sharing and copyright news. In this episode, we talk to Pirate Bay co-founder Peter Sunde.

Kim Dotcom's legal team said the rest of the charges against him should be dropped.

Last week's landmark ruling compelling a Swedish ISP to block The Pirate Bay won't spread quickly, despite copyright holders' wishes. Telecoms giant Telia says that the ruling does not apply to them, so connectivity to the site will continue unless a court orders otherwise. Copyright holders are assessing their options.

A New Zealand court ruled on Monday that internet entrepreneur Kim Dotcom could be extradited to the United States to face charges relating to his Megaupload website, which was shutdown in 2012 following an FBI-ordered raid on his Auckland mansion. "I'm no longer getting extradited for copyright. We won on that. I'm now getting extradited for a law that doesn't even apply,"

Five years ago the US Government launched a criminal case against Megaupload and several of its former employees. One of the main allegations in the indictment is that the site only deleted links to copyright-infringing material, not the actual files. Interestingly, this isn't too far off from what cloud hosting providers such as Google Drive and Dropbox still do today.

Since around 2003, torrent sites have plagued the MPAA. Hydra-like in their ability to withstand all kinds of attacks, from legal onslaughts to domain blocking, torrent platforms are still going strong today. However, what BitTorrent lacks in its standard form is a living-room friendly interface. Regular torrent clients are functional at best, uninviting at worst, and lack the colorful Netflix-style interface demanded by today’s sophisticated media consumer.

Failed strategy for fighting piracy.

With more than two billion downloads, VLC is one of the most popular media players around. The open source tool can play virtually every video file available and comes recommended by many, including some pirate sites. The latter has drawn the attention of France's Tax Investigation Branch, which suggested that VideoLAN might be doing 'shady' deals. Luckily, they soon admitted their mistake.

The legal team of alleged KickassTorrents owner Artem Vaulin is trying to have the criminal case against him dismissed in the US. District Court Judge John Z. Lee has scheduled an oral hearing for next week to discuss the request, and he recently questioned whether the US Government's evidence is sufficient for the court to have jurisdiction.