According to unsealed emails released on Thursday, Meta trained its AI on pirated e-books. Last month, Meta admitted to torrenting a controversial large dataset from LibGen, which includes tens of millions of pirated books. However, details around the torrenting were murky until yesterday, when Meta's unredacted emails were made public for the first time. The new evidence … [Read more...] about Meta trained their AI on Pirate Shadow Libraries
Ebook and Audiobook Piracy News
The Internet Archive lost its court case against publishers
The Internet Archive lost its case against some of the largest publishers in the world after it decided not to elevate the September judgment to the Supreme Court. This ends the saga of the e-book case that started during the pandemic, and we can finally put everything behind us. The primary focus of the case was the Internet Archive’s “Open Library.” After scanning … [Read more...] about The Internet Archive lost its court case against publishers
Penguin Random House puts the kibosh on AI Training
Penguin Random House is the largest book publisher in the world. They recently updated their copyright page to prohibit AI training on any of their print or e-books. This will now gain legal protection against new search engines and anyone who wants to harvest all the books and protect authors. The Bookseller reports that Penguin Random House Publishing changed the copyright … [Read more...] about Penguin Random House puts the kibosh on AI Training
French Court Orders Blocking Access to Z Library
A French court has ordered the piracy site Z Library to be taken down, Publishing Perspective reported. The court ruling comes in response to a case filed by the French Publishers Association, the Syndicat national de l’édition or SNE which alleged Z Library adopted unfair means to distribute e-books that infringed upon the copyright of the respective authors. A dozen of the … [Read more...] about French Court Orders Blocking Access to Z Library
The Cruxes of AI and Book Piracy: A New Era
The issue of e-book piracy has significant implications for authors and publishers. It impacts indie publishers and best-selling authors such as Lee Child (Jack Reacher series) and Michael Crichton. Piracy results in financial losses as copies are distributed for free or used to drive website traffic. Pirated books are often non-existent and used for scamming purposes. Many … [Read more...] about The Cruxes of AI and Book Piracy: A New Era
LibGen ebooks are no longer downloading
Library Genesis is having a severe outage, and for the past week, no ebook or digital textbook downloads have been working. This is a severe blow to students who cannot afford to buy overpriced textbooks and instead decide to pirate them. Many site operators have disappeared, and no new content has been added since April. Some mirrors serve working copies of the digital … [Read more...] about LibGen ebooks are no longer downloading
U.S. Copyright Groups Urge Canada to Intensify Anti-Piracy Measures
Canada has often been accused of being lax when it comes to dealing with copyright issues or enacting effective anti-piracy enforcement policies. The US and the EU have often voiced their concerns on this to Canada on several occasions, prompting Canadian authorities to shore up their acts on this. For instance, it is now possible for rightsholders to get injunctions to block … [Read more...] about U.S. Copyright Groups Urge Canada to Intensify Anti-Piracy Measures
Manga Witnesses Record $800M Loss in May 2024
Japanese manga has been growing in popularity worldwide, but so has piracy. Research has revealed a marked increase in manga piracy, with the Japan-based anti-piracy group Authorized Books of Japan (ABJ) stating that 100 new sites have appeared in just a month offering pirated copies of manga, TorrentFreak reported. The total number of pirate sites offering manga stands at … [Read more...] about Manga Witnesses Record $800M Loss in May 2024
Digital Manga Piracy is becoming a Serious Issue
Digital manga piracy is a massive issue in the United States. In 2023, graphic novel sales generated $1.45 billion, about half of which were manga. These sales stem from comic book shops and direct sales from publishers, Amazon and other bookstores. Manga is big business in the US, Japan, and other major markets. It is estimated that around 1300 pirated manga sites are … [Read more...] about Digital Manga Piracy is becoming a Serious Issue
Anti-piracy Efforts Leads to Greater Sale of Legal Copies, But Only Slightly
With piracy ever on the rise, the best publishers can do is to request DMCA takedowns from Google or pursue legal action against those involved in piracy. No wonder multiple cases are already pending in the courts against Z Library and Anna's Archive, among the most well-known when distributing copyrighted content. With the limited availability of pirated content, the sale of … [Read more...] about Anti-piracy Efforts Leads to Greater Sale of Legal Copies, But Only Slightly