As the most prolific copyright litigant in the United States for several years in a row, Strike 3 Holdings has a name to keep up.

The porn producer is known for filing lawsuits against alleged pirates who download their ‘Milfy,’ ‘Tushy,’ and ‘Vixen’ videos via BitTorrent sites.

Strike 3 monitors pirate sites, and, when their videos are shared in public, it takes decisive action. After tracking down the pirating IP-addresses, it typically files a federal lawsuit, requesting a subpoena to obtain the subscriber’s details.

Once the target is identified, the case can then move forward. While these cases can technically go to trial, they typically result in out-of-court settlements of a few thousand dollars. It’s unknown how profitable these cases are, but the fact that Strike 3 files thousands a year suggests that the business model remains lucrative.

Record: 4,088 Lawsuits in 2025

Strike 3 kept its “settlement machine” going over the past 12 months. In 2025, the company filed 4,088 ^(*) new piracy lawsuits in U.S. federal courts, barely surpassing the previous record of 3,932 set just last year.

Almost all these cases were filed against John Does who are initially only identified by their IP-address. Historically, the lawsuits are settled swiftly after the defendant is identified, and that appears to hold true this year as well. Of all cases filed this year, 2,775 (67.9%) are already closed.

Most of these closed cases disappear from the docket within months, typically following a confidential settlement where defendants pay several thousand dollars to resolve the porn piracy lawsuit without further exposure.

The Cumulative 20,000-Case Milestone

Beyond the annual numbers, 2025 saw Strike 3 cross a historic threshold. Since filing its first case in 2017, the company has now initiated over 20,000 federal copyright lawsuits.

The graph below shows that the number of complaints filed per year has risen steadily since 2020, breaking record after record.

To put these numbers in perspective, Strike 3’s cases alone account for more than half of all copyright lawsuits in the United States in recent years.

While critics and judges have occasionally characterized the business model as a “high-tech shakedown” or an “ATM for the courts,” the company shows no signs of slowing down. On the contrary, it appears to expand to a new class of targets.

$359m Lawsuit Against Meta

While the thousands of “John Doe” cases against individuals have likely brought in millions for Strike 3 over the years, the company’s most ambitious move of 2025 was its lawsuit against tech giant Meta .

In July, Strike 3 accused the tech company of using adult films to assist its AI model training. This follows a broader trend of copyright litigation against AI developers, including several high-profile claims brought by book authors.

Strike 3’s cases specifically focus on Meta’s BitTorrent activity, with the porn producer seeking astronomical damages of up to $359 million. The lawsuit alleges that Meta willfully pirated and redistributed 2,396 adult films to train its AI models, including LLaMA and Movie Gen.

Responding to the lawsuit, Meta dismissed all claims of a coordinated download action. Instead of an AI training effort, Meta suggested that the alleged downloads were “personal use” by its own employees, contractors, or visitors using its corporate networks and servers.

Whether the Meta lawsuit ends in a landmark ruling or a quiet settlement, Strike 3’s litigation engine shows no signs of cooling down. Whatever happens on the AI front in 2026, the company’s “John Doe” settlement machine will likely continue to churn out new complaints in the background.

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(*) Note: the data presented here are based on a PACER search for cases filed between January 1 and December 31, 2025, where ‘Strike 3’ is listed as a party. All known non-copyright cases have been filtered out.

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.