Tokyo-based Manga publisher Shueisha seeking help from Google and Hurricane Electric

Tokyo-based Manga publisher, Shueisha, recently filed an application in the US, where he seeks help from Google and Hurricane Electric to identify alleged copyright infringers. Central to the case is Manga Bank which is a massive Manga indexing platform. It is known for servicing around 80 million visits per month. As a result, many companies include Shueisha, Kadowaka, Kodansha, and Shogakukan took legal action with the sole aim to shut down or disrupt piracy platforms. Such companies want to set a deterrent message to various site operators and consumers of pirated content alike.

A San Francisco-based law firm representing Shueisha has already filed an ex-parte application at a California District Court for an order granting permission for the discovery of information to be used in a foreign proceeding. “[Mangabank.org] is written in Japanese and invites viewers to search infringing material by titles, authors, and other keywords, seemingly catered to Japanese language viewers. The Infringing Websites [those listed above] were likely to be used to store the infringing copies so that they can reduce the traffic of the main infringing website and makes it more accessible,” Shueisha notes.

However, the publisher tried his best to obtain information about the sites’ operators from Cloudflare using a DMCA subpoena before filing his request. Anyhow, the personal information that was handed over to him did not prove useful in identifying anyone in particular but fortunately, Cloudflare provided a few other details that helped Shueisha to pick up leads.

In its application, Shueisha made a request from the witnesses, i.e., Google and Hurricane Electric, to hand over information that they held in the alleged pirates’ respective accounts so it would be easier to track them down. The publisher sought the following things that were used when the site operator[s] created and accessed their accounts:

1. Names,
2. Physical addresses,
3. Telephone numbers,
4. Email addresses, and
5. The IP addresses.

“Applicant intends to bring a lawsuit in Japan or potentially in China against the person associated with the Witnesses’ accounts in question as soon as the person’s identity has been ascertained through the discovery sought by this application,” the application reveals. At the time of writing the court has not yet signed off the request of Shueisha but irrespective of anything it seems very much determined to find out who these infringers are. The company also suggests that it is planning a civil lawsuit. Since Shueisha seems to be very determined, everyone can hope for a positive outcome.