Kickass torrents is the newest pirating website to be officially nuked by the Australian Federal Court after a Friday's ruling found that the site's primary purpose was to infringe copyrights of several big-name artists.
Label representatives such as Justin Bieber, AC/DC, and Major Lazer could now rest easy after domains linked to torrent sharing service Kickass Torrents will be blocked in the next two weeks after the court handed down orders to block the sites, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.
According to the court ruling presided by Judge Stephen Burley, millions of Australian users visit the Kickass Torrents's sites every month and the breach of copyright was "flagrant."
"The large number of monthly visits to the KAT website indicate that the infringement facilitated by the KAT website can be described as flagrant and reflect an open disregard for copyright on the part of the operators of the KAT website," Burley said.
The order followed after the Australian arms of Universal Music, Australian Music Corporation, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music, Australasian Performing Right Association, and several other music groups have all collaborated to put an end to illegal downloading across the sites in 2016.
The music and entertainment groups argued that KAT website users have infringed the copyright of various works licensed by the group, including but not limited to Fall Out Boy, Justin Bieber, Ellie Goulding, Jessica Mauboy, and Kite String Triangle.
The Federal Court ordered 20 internet service providers including telecommunications giants TPG and Telstra to block the said illegal sites within 15 days. Music companies are also allowed to contact the court if new a new KAT site appears, and the new site name could be blocked also.
Kickass Torrent is also blocked on other countries such as Belgium, Britain, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, and Italy.