Seedboxes in the crosshairs of justice? A doomed first serve


Robin Lamorlette

March 07, 2023 at 12:30 p.m.

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seedbox download download server

© Overearth / Shutterstock

A Danish provider of so-called seedbox servers sharing pirated works was caught by the courts and surrendered without contest.

This process of sharing on legal paper, but widely used in the field of illegal downloading, is slowly but surely beginning to attract the attention of justice.

Seeders, stop seeding »

Seedboxes are a widely known and widespread concept. Available at all times, these servers allow torrent clients to share or “seeder” any content they host. Most of this content is of course pirated, whether it’s movies, music or video games.

Naturally, this technique has drawn the wrath of rights holders, who however have great difficulty in bringing the providers of such services to justice. However, this was not the case for Kasper Nielsen who, behind his company HNielsen Networks, provided servers configured in the form of seedboxes for illegal purposes.

The Danish association of rights holders Rights Alliance, with the help of the Danish intervention branch of the services for the protection of intellectual property, thus arrested the man and five of his collaborators in 2021. The reason for the arrest is based on the apprehended alleged links to various local torrent sites like ShareUniversity, Superbits and DanishBytes.

An accused who surrendered without resistance

Nielsen was thus condemned on February 28 for selling seedboxes knowing that its servers were used for the purpose of sharing content without the permission of the rights holders. The charge mentions no less than 3,838 works protected by copyright and despite everything made available illegally on the sites mentioned earlier.

He was sentenced to a three-month conditional detention sentence as well as a fine of 300,000 Danish kroner (about 40,000 euros), the amount paid by users to access his seedboxes. He must also pay nearly 300,000 Danish crowns in compensation to Rights Alliance.

Seedbox providers are responsible for ensuring that their services are not used for illegal purposes. Thus, this case allows us to send a strong signal to other providers: you cannot deliberately sell your services on the illegal market. said Maria Fredenslund, Director of Rights Alliance.

Nielsen complied with the court’s decision without contesting it: ” I’m glad the case is closed, so I can now focus on myself and my business. It remains to be seen whether such a case will serve as case law against the practice of seedboxes for illegal purposes, or whether it will remain a grain of sand in the desert, as is particularly the case for pirate sites.

Source : Rights Alliance



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