He Philippine Intellectual Property Office has made its first request to block websites, targeting 11 domains and subdomains linked to the YTS torrent site.
The marked sites are the following:
- torrents.yts.rs
- yts.ag
- yts.am
- yts.dirproxy.com
- yts.do
- yts.lt
- yts.mx
- yts.rs
- yts.unlocked.love
- ytssss.jamsbase.com
- ytsuproxy.to
Nathanial S. Arevalo, Deputy Director General of IPOPHL, signed the site blocking request on May 3, 2024, after the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Office of the aforementioned government agency found that these sites were involved in piracy and copyright infringement by allowing users to download or stream pirated movies and TV shows. This violates Section 216 of the Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines and the Rules on Voluntary Administrative Blocking of Sites.
Citing a 2015 report by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPA), IPOPHL said YTS is among the world's most prolific sites for pirating copyrighted content. The report estimated that the site has a library of around 4,500 infringed movie titles. Flagged sites associated with YTS are also listed on the World Intellectual Property Organization's WIPO Alert, an online platform for reporting copyright-infringing websites.
Following IPOPHL's request, the National Telecommunications Commission issued a memorandum on May 16, instructing local Internet service providers to block access to these sites and report compliance within five days.
In a statement, the MPA said it would continue to work closely with the Philippine government and the local creative industry to combat digital piracy. Members of the MPA include Netflix Studios, Disney, Warner Bros and Sony Pictures.
