The long battle against piracy manga has reached a crucial new stage. Four Japanese publishing giants-Shueisha, Kodansha, Shogakukan, and Kadokawa-won their copyright lawsuit against American internet infrastructure company Cloudflare. The verdict is not just about money, but a strong signal for the future of the creative industry.
Tokyo Court Ruling Against Cloudflare
The Tokyo District Court has ruled that Cloudflare is liable for the losses suffered by publishers due to copyright infringement. This decision concerns the piracy of popular works such as One Piece, Attack on Titan, and Kingdom.
In its ruling, the court recognized that the total losses suffered by the publishers amounted to 3.6 billion yen (approximately US$24 million). However, as the publishers only claimed a portion of that figure, Cloudflare was ordered to pay damages of about 500 million yen (about US$3.3 million).
Although the amount paid is less than the total damages, this verdict sets a very important legal precedent. This victory could change the way CDN (Content Delivery Network) services work and become a new weapon in the fight against digital piracy.
Why is Cloudflare Considered Liable?
You might ask, how can a service provider like Cloudflare be implicated? A lawsuit filed in 2022 highlighted Cloudflare's role in distributing data for illegal manga sites.
According to the publishers' argument, Cloudflare's lax policies provided an opening for piracy. The court agreed with this argument, emphasizing that Cloudflare's failure to implement stricter identity verification procedures was the main point.
Their policy of only requiring an email address for free registration allows pirate site operators to hide their true identity. As a result, they can operate anonymously while continuing to profit from advertising, while creators and publishers lose out. It is this negligence for which Cloudflare has been held liable.
The Long Trail of Fighting Piracy Sites
This is not a battle that happened overnight. You may remember the case of Mangamura's website, which finally went down in April 2018 after the publishers filed criminal charges. Since then, Japanese authorities have been actively investigating and making arrests.
After Mangamura disappeared, “successor” sites such as Hoshi no Romi emerged, which also used Cloudflare's services. This prompted the publishers to file a legal motion against Cloudflare in August 2018.
In fact, there was a deal in June 2019 where Cloudflare agreed to stop storing cache content from pirated sites if a court declares them illegal. However, the problem continues, prompting publishers to take more serious legal action.
These legal efforts extend beyond Japan as well. The publishers filed a lawsuit in New York against the operator of Hoshi no Romi and also asked a California court to force Google to reveal the operator of the Manga Bank website, having previously requested data from Cloudflare.
The Way Forward and Impact on the Industry
In response to this verdict, the four publishers officially released their statements. You can read it directly through the link from Shueisha, Kodansha, Shogakukan, and Kadokawa. They welcomed this ruling as a preventive measure to prevent misuse of CDN services in the future.
They also reaffirmed their commitment to continue protecting creators' rights and works from all forms of copyright infringement. This victory is seen as a strong message for other tech platforms to be more proactive in the fight against piracy.
Publishers emphasize that services like those offered by Cloudflare are actually very useful if used for the right purpose, namely “stable and efficient distribution of legitimate content to users.”
This victory is also in line with their broader anti-piracy project. These four publishers are part of the Content Overseas Distribution Association (CODA), which has formed the International Anti-Piracy Organization (IAPO) to combat anime and manga piracy on a global level.
Source: Comic Natalie via Anime News Network
