Despite some other competitors, PrimeWire is one of the most popular pirate streaming portals on the Internet today. The site has been operating for eight years in various forms, including the 1 Channel brand.

Like many similar sites, PrimeWire has played a legitimate role in anti-piracy issues for years. Its domains have been blocked by court orders in the UK, Ireland, Norway, Denmark and Portugal, and the site has been repeatedly labeled an “infamous marketplace” by the MPA.

Trial in America

Last November, the MPA and the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment won a DMCA subpone from a US court that forced Cloudflare to change all the details about PrimeWire’s operator.

Subsequently, in early December, companies including Paramount, Universal, Warner, Columbia, Disney and Netflix filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against the site’s alleged operators, including moderators Dev_Team, Silverrain, Fugitive and drodman250.

In addition to demanding millions in damages, the studios demanded a broad ban on knee-jerk primaries before a full trial on the merits of the case.

Primary injection considerations

Following a hearing on Friday, January 3, 2022, Judge Mark C. Snyder of the United States District Court in the Central District of California ruled.

Summarizing the plaintiffs’ business models, the judge acknowledged that the defendants’ alleged conduct violated the studios’ rights, including providing links to infringing movies and TV shows hosted on third-party sites.

“Complainants have not authorized digital reproduction or streaming of their copyrighted works. Therefore, streaming that occurs on PrimeWire or on websites with primerware links is a violation of copyright law, ”wrote Justice Scoorsi.

“These infringements can be attributed to the defendants, because under the theory of contributory infringement, if one party contributes objectively to the infringement, one party is liable for the infringement.”

The judge acknowledged that the primaries’ actions were deliberate because the platform was requesting remakes and performances on its forum (links to movies and TV shows). Therefore, there is an “important chance” of success based on the suit merits of the plaintiffs.

Weigh the criteria

In the absence of involvement in the primaries proceedings, the judge weighed in on the injection request against the lawsuit and admitted that the plaintiffs had expressed their satisfaction that they would face “irreparable harm” without an injection.

The judge acknowledged that an injection may damage the primer, and that the extent of the violation must be taken into account and the defendants’ failure to appear. Also, it would be in the public interest to order one, as an injection will help prevent widespread copyright infringement.

Preliminary injunction granted

At the request of the studios, Judge Scorsese granted a preliminary injunction restraining Primewire from further infringing on the plaintiffs’ rights.

It commands and prohibits primitive defendants and their collaborators from engaging in a variety of activities, including linking, distributing, reproducing, copying, hosting, uploading, and displaying copyrighted work.

Defendants are ordered to refrain from any actions that facilitate, facilitate, assist, motivate or motivate any user or third party to perform any of the above acts.

The judge ruled that neither the plaintiffs nor their agents could take any action to transfer the domains Primewire.li, Primewire.ag or Primewire.vc to any other domain domain, when prima facie wire seems to be taken offline. Name or Registrar. At this time, domain name registrars and registrars include API Gmbh, Gandi SAS, Namecheap, Inc., Nic AG, SWITCH, Afilias, Inc. And freeze and deactivate three PrimeWire domains.

The judge says the primary injunction could be challenged, overturned or terminated if the prima facie defendants decide to appear in court, but that does not seem likely at present. At the time of writing, all three domains remain active, but this is expected to change in the coming days. There are other areas available for PrimeWire, however, it may decide to release them in a timely manner.

In a press release, the MPA welcomed the ban.

“The Motion Picture Association applauds the court’s decision to impose a preliminary ban on the operators of the infamous foreign online piracy operation, PrimeWire, which operates anonymously, blatantly and repeatedly ignores the law. Filing civil suits against piracy operators is one of the many ways in which the MPA actively intervenes to protect the legitimate marketplace for creative content around the world, ”the group said.

A copy of the preliminary order can be found here (pdf)