Pirate Bay defies ISP block ruling

The Pirate Bay is standing defiant in the face of an imminent shutdown in the UK after the High Court ruled this week that the torrent site would be blocked.

Five internet service providers such as Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin Media were ordered to prevent access to the Piratebay.org website after the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) was successful in its case of copyright infringement.

The BPI claimed that filesharing websites such as The Pirate Bay “destroy jobs in the UK and undermine investment in new British artists”.

In a blog posting on the torrent site however, The Pirate Bay called on users to “stand united” against what it called censorship and to circumvent the ruling, whilst also asking them to write to local MPs and ISP providers to make their voice heard.

“We are simply competitors that they just managed to squeeze out of their market, in a maffiesque way,” read a statement.

Internet piracy has plagued the games industry for a number of years, with companies such as Crytek claiming that four million copies if its triple-A shooter Crysis 2 had been shared online.