2 Russians arrested, charged with running online e-book piracy website
Federal prosecutors have charged two Russian nationals on allegations they operated the online e-book piracy website Z-Library. The website has been shut down by the Justice Department.
Russian nationals Anton Napolsky, 33, and Valeriia Ermakova, 27, were arrested Nov. 3 in Cordoba, Argentina, the Justice Department said in a news release Wednesday. They have been charged with criminal copyright infringement, wire fraud and money laundering. They are accused of running Z-Library, which billed itself as "the world's largest library," prosecutors said.
The U.S government also seized and shut down Z-Library's network of 249 online domains around the time of the arrests, prosecutors said.
Z-Library offered e-books in a variety of file formats, and encouraged users to upload and download titles, prosecutors said.
The online library, which had been active since 2009, claimed to offer more than 11 million e-books for download, prosecutors said. But many of the e-books offered by Z-Library are protected intellectual property "for which authors hold copyrights and publishers hold exclusive distribution rights."
According to prosecutors, the primary purpose of the online library was as a place where users could illegally download copyrighted books for free.
"The defendants are alleged to have operated a website for over a decade whose central purpose was providing stolen intellectual property, in violation of copyright laws," Michael J. Driscoll, assistant director-in-charge for the FBI's New York field office, said in a statement. "Intellectual property theft crimes deprive their victims of both ingenuity and hard-earned revenue. The FBI is determined to ensure those willing to steal and profit from the creativity of others are stopped and made to face the consequences in the criminal justice system."
The New York-based Authors Guild and the London-based Publishers Association also provided assistance in the investigation.
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