On January 8, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) released its "2024 Review of Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting and Piracy" – also known as its Notorious Markets List (NML). The NLM “highlights prominent and illustrative examples of online and physical markets that reportedly engage in, facilitate, turn a blind eye to, or benefit from substantial piracy or counterfeiting," with a goal "to motivate appropriate action by the private sector and governments to reduce piracy and counterfeiting."
The NML noted law enforcement actions taken in 2024 by foreign nations, in some instances in partnership with the US Department of Justice, against pirate streaming services, including pirate-enabled Internet Protocol television (IPTV) services that rely on ad-supported "cyberlocker" sites to facilitate the storage and distribution of pirated content. Also, the NML noted that many copyright owners who made filings in the US Trade Representative’s proceeding raised continued concerns about "bulletproof" Internet service providers that facilitate piracy through avowed leniency in permitting users to upload and distribute infringing content, hiding their locations, and refusing to respond to takedown requests from copyright owners. Additionally, the NML listed some websites across the globe that are known to traffic in infringing content as well as physical market locations in foreign nations where physical copies of infringing are trafficked.
The U.S. Constitution's Article I, Section 8 Copyright Clause recognizes that copyrighted property deserves to be secured from online and physical piracy. My February 2024 Perspectives from FSF Scholars, "Congress and the Administration Should Move Against Online Copyright Piracy," points to stepped-up criminal prosecutions against mass online piracy operations as one way of securing copyrighted property. As pointed out in the 2024 NML, copyright piracy is a serious problem and it's one the incoming Trump Administration should make solid efforts to combat. Indeed, as explained in a June 2021 Perspectives from FSF Scholars, "Fighting Online Piracy Will Boost American Economy and Jobs."
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