Takedown Notices for Pirate Sites Triple But Piracy Keeps Growing

A new report shows takedown notices for pirated live sports streams exploded to over 15 million in the first half of 2025.

That’s nearly triple the previous levels. But here’s the kicker – the success rate plummeted to just 5%, down from 19% in late 2024.

The numbers look scary at first glance. But when you dig deeper, the story becomes more complex.

Why Takedown Success Rates Are Falling

The report from Grant Thornton blames online intermediaries for not acting fast enough. Only 2.7% of reported streams got suspended within 30 minutes of receiving notices. Most of the blame falls on services like Cloudflare, which the report categorizes as “other” providers.

Here’s the problem with that logic: Cloudflare doesn’t host the content. They provide proxy services. Under U.S. law, they’re not required to take down content they don’t actually host. Sports leagues know this, yet they keep sending notices anyway.

By flooding services like Cloudflare with notices they know won’t work, rightsholders are artificially lowering their own success rates. This creates data that supports their narrative about ineffective enforcement.

The Numbers Game Gets Exposed

Even LaLiga caught onto this issue. They initially published a press release claiming “piracy of live sports events soars.” Hours later, they changed the headline to focus on increased detection efforts rather than actual piracy growth.

That’s a huge difference. More takedown notices don’t necessarily mean more piracy. They might just mean better detection technology or more aggressive enforcement strategies.

The report includes data from ten rightsholders – two more than last year’s study. More companies sending notices naturally leads to higher volumes, regardless of whether piracy actually increased.

The Real Issue Behind the Numbers (Final Thoughts)

All of this circles back to making live content more affordable and accessible for average consumers. Media companies and anti-piracy authorities would rather spend millions of dollars playing an endless game of streaming whac-a-mole than address the root cause.

Consumers turn to unauthorized streams because legitimate options often cost too much or aren’t available in their region. Instead of creating better, cheaper alternatives, the industry focuses on takedown campaigns that clearly aren’t working.

The methodology problems in this report highlight how enforcement groups twist data to support stricter regulations. They’re not interested in solving the underlying issues that drive people to pirated streams in the first place.

For more details on this story, refer to the original study from Grant Thornton (PDF) and the report from TorrentFreak.

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