Much like the closure of Torrentz and other popular torrent sites, Kickass Torrents is expected to be closed down permanently, as the website remains inaccessible, pending the trial for the extradition of supposed website owner Artem Vaulin.
Vaulin was arrested earlier this year, and he has been in custody in Poland ever since. The 30-year old Ukranian is said to be the brains behind KAT, one of the more popular torrent download websites.
However, even as the legal battle progresses, Vaulin will have to remain in prison. According to the Court of Appeals in Warsaw, Vaulin should remain in custody while the extradition proceedings are being heard. Reportedly, the evidence submitted by the authorities are compelling enough for Vaulin to remain incarcerated.
The US government has filed for a criminal indictment of Vaulin, citing that KAT's catalog points to copyright infringement. US Attorney Zachary Fardon, in a reply to Vaulin's defense team requesting for the dismissal of the case, stated: "These indexed files enabled users to obtain copyrighted content from other users, including from the defendant's own servers. KAT therefore functioned like a (lucrative) flea market for infringing movies, television shows, video games, music, and computer software."
Meanwhile, as the case and extradition request for Vaulin continue, the torrent site that Vaulin supposedly owns remains shut down. KAT's apparent closure is in the headlines as the website is one of the biggest and most popular torrent sites that were taken down recently. Apart from KAT, sites like Torrentz and ExtraTorrent are now permanently closed. Even The Pirate Bay, inarguably the largest file-sharing website, has been closed down intermittently due to the crackdown.
Although the biggest torrent sites are down, it has not hindered the torrent community in managing file sharing websites. It is rumored that another site, Megaupload, will come back next year. Meanwhile, a number of new torrent sites 1337x.to have cropped up, accommodating the millions of users displaced by the websites closing down.
