3 Count: Streameast Shuttered

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1: Streameast Shut Down: World’s Most Massive Sports Piracy Ring Disabled After Raid

First off today, Todd Spangler at Variety reports the “notorious piracy network” Streameast has been shuttered by the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE).

Streameast was famous for carrying illegal streams of live sporting events. According to ACE, it received more than 1.6 billion visits in the past year, making it the most popular pirate site for sports streaming.

The closure follows a raid by Egyptian law enforcement. They also seized three laptops, four smartphones and over $300,000 in cash and cryptocurrency. The raid did not have any arrests, but two men were arrested last month on suspicion of copyright infringement. The investigation had been ongoing for over a year.

2: LaLiga Touts ‘Historic’ IPTV Piracy Crackdown, Key Questions Remain Unanswered

Next up today, Ernesto Van der Sar at Torrentfreak writes that LaLiga, the soccer league in Argentina, has shut down an illegal IPTV network that reportedly had over eight million paid subscribers.

No arrests were made in the closure, but photos taken after the raid show large amounts of cash and various other items that were seized. The company operated under a variety of names, all of which are offline as of this writing.

In addition to the closure, the authorities have also implicated several legitimate companies, including Goose, BitKernel and Peliplat, for assisting the network. LaLiga touted this closure as a “turning point” in the fight against piracy.

3: Top FDA Official Demands Removal of YouTube Videos in Which He Criticized Covid Vaccines

Finally, today, Stephanie Kirchgaessner at The Guardian reports that a YouTuber has accused Vinay Prasad, the US Food and Drug Administration’s top vaccine regulator, of having his channel deleted via copyright strikes.

The accusations come from Jonathan Howard, who says that Prasad demanded the removal of six videos from Howard’s channel. Howard is a neurologist and psychiatrist and has been critical of Prasad’s position on vaccines. His channel had over 350 videos featuring various doctors making statements about vaccines, including anti-vaccine statements by Prasad.

In the past, Prasad has complained about alleged social media censorship. However, in a statement, the FDA said that the videos remain available to watch on YouTube and that Howard illegally reuploaded them. Howard, however, claims that the move is targeting only Prasad’s critics, not his supporters.

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