Putlocker is a file hosting index website used for

streaming Streaming media refers to multimedia delivered through a network for playback using a media player. Media is transferred in a ''stream'' of packets from a server to a client and is rendered in real-time; this contrasts with file downl ...

entertainment media, particularly films and television series, for free. The initial website originated in the United Kingdom in 2011, and grew to receive millions of daily visitors after the shutdown of Megaupload. In May 2016, the website was blocked in the UK by a High Court order, and at its peak prior to a temporary closure in late 2016, Alexa Internet listed Putlocker as ranking among the top 250 most-visited websites worldwide. Putlocker has been reported by the

Motion Picture Association The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios, five major film studios of the Cinema of the United States, United States, the Major film studios#Mini-majors, mini-major Amazon MGM Stud ...

(MPA) as a major

piracy Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and valuable goods, or taking hostages. Those who conduct acts of piracy are call ...

threat. Putlocker's domain address has changed multiple times throughout its history, with a number of URLs bearing the Putlocker name being suspended or seized. It is not publicly known whether an official Putlocker website maintained by the original team remains available online, but at least fifty

mirror A mirror, also known as a looking glass, is an object that Reflection (physics), reflects an image. Light that bounces off a mirror forms an image of whatever is in front of it, which is then focused through the lens of the eye or a camera ...

or proxy websites, many of which use the Putlocker name, have been identified.

History

Launch and popularity

Putlocker originated in the United Kingdom under the URL putlocker.com. In early January 2012, the website received about 800,000 visitors a day, but after the website Megaupload was shut down due to

copyright infringement Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of Copyright#Scope, works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the c ...

, Putlocker began receiving approximately 1.6 million visitors a day. The website's operations officer, Adrian Petroff, found Megaupload's closure worrying, stating "who needs SOPA when a studio exec can make a wish/hit list and sites 'voluntarily' shut down?" In March 2012, Putlocker was identified by Alfred Perry, vice president for worldwide content protection at

Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...

, as one of the "top 5 rogue cyberlocker services". The website's URL was changed to putlocker.bz, an address which was seized by the Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit of the UK in June 2014, and was subsequently changed to putlocker.is, a domain located in Iceland. In India, Putlocker and its clones have been blocked since the website first gained prominence in 2011, this followed from a court injunction in a case filed by Reliance BIG Pictures, ordering the blocking of file sharing websites which hosted copyrighted content. In 2014, "Putlocker" was reported as being one of the top trending search queries on

Google Search Google Search (also known simply as Google or Google.com) is a search engine operated by Google. It allows users to search for information on the World Wide Web, Web by entering keywords or phrases. Google Search uses algorithms to analyze an ...

in Canada for that year.

2016–present

From around early October 2016, the putlocker.is address displayed an error stating that the website's host service was inaccessible. Around this time, the

(MPA) reported Putlocker to the

Office of the United States Trade Representative The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) is an agency of the United States federal government responsible for developing and promoting United States foreign trade policies. Part of the Executive Office of the President, it ...

as a piracy threat. The MPA revealed that Putlocker operated from Vietnam, and that its servers were hosted by the Swiss company Private Layer. Prior to its closure, putlocker.is was listed among the top 250 websites globally and the top 150 in the United States, according to Alexa data. A mirror site under the address putlocker.today appeared shortly after the assumed termination of putlocker.is, and on 17 October 2016, an address under the name putlocker9.com was reported to be available. On 2 November 2016, the putlocker.is address became active again, redirecting its users to the updated URL putlockers.ch. On 27 February 2017, the putlockers.ch address was suspended after a ruling by a ''Tribunal d'arrondissement'' of Luxembourg in favour of the

Belgian Entertainment Association The Belgian Recorded Music Association (BRMA), previously Belgian Entertainment Association (BEA) is the organisation that represents the interests of the music industry in Belgium. The BRMA is the local record industry association in Belgium of ...

, and the domain ownership transferred to EuroDNS. The chief legal officer of EuroDNS, Luc Seufer, stated that EuroDNS is required to "prevent any 'reactivation' of this domain name utlockers.chuntil its expiration date". Following the seizure of the putlockers.ch address, the previously used putlocker.is domain was made functional again. In March 2017, it was reported that Ted Osius, then United States Ambassador to Vietnam, had held a meeting with Truong Minh Tuan, Vietnam's Minister of Information and Communications, during which Osius urged for the criminal prosecution of Putlocker, along with the websites 123Movies and KissCartoon, for copyright infringement. Not long afterwards, putlocker.is, which changed to putlockertv.is and subsequently putlockers.cc, was reportedly redirecting visitors to a scamming site. In May 2017, at least three working sites bearing the Putlocker name were known to be available: putlocker.rs, with a Serbian

top-level domain A top-level domain (TLD) is one of the domain name, domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System of the Internet after the root domain. The top-level domain names are installed in the DNS root zone, root zone of the nam ...

(TLD), putlockertv.ist, with an Istanbulite TLD, and putlockerhd.is, with an Icelandic TLD. In July 2017, the ''

International Business Times The ''International Business Times'' is an American online newspaper that publishes five national editions in four languages. The publication, sometimes called ''IBTimes'' or ''IBT'', offers news, opinion and editorial commentary on business and ...

'' reported that "15% of internet users in the UK are either infringing copyright through streaming or illegal downloads, with pirated TV material primarily accessed through Kodi (16%) or Putlocker (17%)". In August 2017, Justice John Nicholas of the

Federal Court of Australia The Federal Court of Australia is an Australian superior court which has jurisdiction to deal with most civil disputes governed by federal law (with the exception of family law matters), along with some summary (less serious) and indictable (mo ...

ordered Australian internet service providers to block access to 42 piracy sites in a case brought by Village Roadshow, with Putlocker, KissCartoon, and GoMovies being among those ordered to be blocked. In June 2018, Trevon Maurice Franklin of

Fresno, California Fresno (; ) is a city in the San Joaquin Valley of California, United States. It is the county seat of Fresno County, California, Fresno County and the largest city in the greater Central Valley (California), Central Valley region. It covers a ...

pleaded guilty to violating federal copyright law back in February 2016, when he downloaded the superhero film '' Deadpool'' from Putlocker and then uploaded it to

Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...

eight days after the film was released theatrically in the United States. As a result, the film was viewed over 6 million times for free, with the total retail value of the copies being estimated at around $2,500. In October 2018, Franklin was sentenced to 24 days in federal detention for a Class A Misdemeanor followed by a year of supervised release, including 20 hours of community service per week.

References

Sources

External links