The Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (Ace), an international coalition comprising major Hollywood studios such as Netflix, Apple TV+, Amazon, and Walt Disney Studios, recently announced that it had successfully collaborated with Vietnamese police to shut down Fmovies.to, an illegal streaming operation based in Vietnam.
In addition to Fmovies, the operation also led to the closure of Vidsrc.to and its affiliated video hosting platforms, both of which were reportedly operated by the same individuals. Two Vietnamese men associated with the ring have been arrested, although charges have not been formally filed yet.
The sting also target related sites including Bflixz, Flixtorz, Movies7, and Myflixer, all of which were part of what Ace described as the largest pirate streaming network globally, with over 6.7 billion website visits from January 2023 to June 2024. Charles Rivkin, CEO of the Motion Picture Association (MPA) and chairman of Ace, praised the takedown as a significant win for the global creative community, especially for actors, writers, and significant Hollywood studios.
Larissa Knapp, the MPA’s executive vice-president and chief content protection officer, noted that the operation sends a strong message to pirates and expressed anticipation for continued collaboration with Vietnamese authorities and U.S. law enforcement agencies. This was essentially a coordinated effort in underscoring the effectiveness in international cooperation in combating online piracy.
Since Ace has worked with various law enforcement entities to combat online piracy through legal actions and cease-and-desist orders, It’s not a stretch to say that Fmovies has been a long-standing target for Ace. A significant portion of its web traffic comes from the U.S. and the movie piracy ring has been listed in the U.S. Trade Representative’s list of notorious markets for piracy for a while now.
(Source: The Guardian, The Hollywood Reporter, Motion Picture Association, Ace)
