The French download platform Uptobox, very often used to share illegal content, is no longer accessible. An operation took place to put an end to its hacking practices. The Uptostream site is also affected.
You tried to access the site Uptobox and its associated service Uptostream yesterday or today and can’t do it? You are not the only one. Both platforms are completely inaccessible for now and may never come back online. If you don’t know it, Uptobox is a site allowing you tohost and share files. Nothing special in itself, except thatit is mainly used to download illegal content : films, series, music, video games…
This is precisely why it is no longer possible to go there. In a press release, the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE) announces that it has close Uptobox as well as Uptostream. The alliance in question is not made up of just anyone: Amazon, Apple TV+, NBCUniversal, Netflix Studios LLC, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Paramount, Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, Warner Bros… among others.
Pirate sites Uptobox and Uptostream closed after anti-piracy action
The operation was carried out jointly in France and to United Arab Emirates. Why the Middle East? Because, according to the ACE press release, the two French administrators of the site reside in Dubai. There is no mention of direct action against them such as arrest. According to the alliance, the two services it closed had recorded 1.5 billion visits in 3 years.
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On his account X (Twitter), Uptobox does not seem to be overly worried. It speaks of a “technical incident” and reassures its users that their data is protected and anonymous. The platform is visibly ready to get back on track despite the situation: “We are not going to give up, our team is working hard to resolve this situation as quickly as possible”. Even if it does not reopen, we can doubt that it would have a real impact on piracy. Repeated shutdowns of pirate sites are rather ineffective.
Following the incident, we lost access to the servers containing the user files, they are no longer reachable, we have not yet had any documented confirmation of the seizure of our servers by anyone.
— Uptobox.com (@Uptobox_com) September 20, 2023