A user of controversial BitTorrent directory The Pirate Bay has uploaded what must surely be the ultimate illegal download – a backup of the entire Pirate Bay site including its entire database of (mostly illegal) files.
With the site changing hands in a couple of weeks’ time, the user has decided it’s worthwhile having an ‘insurance policy’ in case the new owners decide to remove any content.
Global Gaming Factory X, the Swedish company who will soon control The Pirate Bay has made clear it is taking the site into new legitimate territory by making deals with major media companies. Hardcore users of the site are understandably worried that the new approach will lead to unlicensed torrents being removed.
Torrentfreak reports that the entire Pirate Bay site, including every torrent available at the time the user took the backup, takes up just 21.3 Gigabytes. Why so small? Torrents are simply ‘pointer’ files that send downloaders to other users’ computers to download the actual music, video or software files.
The result of this move is that numerous clones of the current Pirate Bay site could be up and running within days. It’s a reminder that internet piracy is virtually unstoppable, no matter what media companies and politicians may say.
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