After being shut down by the Ukrainian police, Demonoid – one of the leading torrent portals out there – is not yet off the hook as the staff heading the website is now under criminal investigation and prosecution in Mexico.
Yesterday Ukraine confirmed that Demonoid was not only subject to DDoS attacks, but has also been raided by authorities. Last week government authorities paid a visit to ColoCall – the company which hosted Demonoid – in order to shut the website down.
“Investigators have copied all the information from the servers Demonoid and sealed them,†an anonymous ColoCall source told the local news website Kommersant.
Commercial Director at ColoCall Peter Vlasenko stated that his company warned Demonoid several times about complaints being filed against the website. Also, he warned that this could force Demonoid’s ISP to cut any relations with the website, an action that actually took place last week.
“The Division of Economic Crimes [DEC] received an international request from Interpol to send a request to the company ColoCall. DEC sent the request to the provider, after which the ISP decided to stop working with Demonoid,†Sergei Burlakov – Ukraine’s Ministry of Internal Affairs – said.
Meanwhile, a criminal investigation has been opened against the operator(s) of the website:
“In Mexico a criminal case against the owners of Demonoid has been initiated and the tracker is charged with intellectual property rights violations,†Burlakov confirmed.
In October 2011 Mexican authorities raided Monterrey – the capital city of the north-eastern Mexican state of Nuevo León – with the purpose to apprehend one of Demonoid’s owners. After the raid, access to the website in Mexico was completely shut down.
It is yet unclear if the investigation is carried out against the same person who was arrested in Mexico or not.
