Pirate sites and services can be a real challenge for rightsholders to deal with. In India, however, recent court orders have proven to be quite effective.

Indian courts have issued pirate site blocking orders for over a decade. Initially, these orders were relatively basic, requiring local Internet providers to block specific domain names.

Super Dynamic++ Anti-Hydra Injunctions

These regular injunctions were only partially effective. After the High Court granted a blocking injunction, pirate sites would often switch to new domains, requiring rightsholders to return to court to get these blocked as well.

To deal with this problem, the dynamic injunction was invented. These orders were issued to more effectively deny access to content made available on pirate sites. ISPs were not only required to block original domains but also any clones and mirror sites that surfaced after the order was signed.

When dynamic injunctions were no longer sufficient to slay the piracy hydra , rightsholders suggested upgrading the Indian blocking regime with Dynamic ++ injunctions. These orders also protect copyrighted content that has yet to be registered.

In addition, Dynamic++ orders and their ‘ superlative ‘ variant also include domain name registrars as defendants . This includes blocking orders targeted at U.S. domain registrars.

Hollywood Targets U.S. Companies Through India

The ability to target domain name registrants proved to be a game changer. Over the past two years, it allowed rightsholders to disable domains of various prominent pirate sites, some with dozens of millions of visitors. While these sites could simply register new domains, the legal efforts certainly affected their operation.

For this reason, it is no surprise to see that several American movie industry players have ramped up their enforcement actions in India, targeting hundreds of domains at a time. And since these orders effectively suspend domains at various domain name registrars, new requests keep coming in.

As reported by Verdictum a few days ago, the High Court in New Delhi issued a new blocking injunction on December 18, targeting more than 150 pirate site domains , including yflix.to, animesuge.bz, bs.to, and many others.

The complaint is filed by Warner Bros., Apple, Crunchyroll, Disney, and Netflix, which are all connected to the MPA’s anti-piracy arm, ACE. The referenced works include some of the most pirated titles , such as Stranger Things, Squid Game, and Silo.

Global Kill Switch Fails

In addition to targeting Indian ISPs, the order also lists various domain name registries and related organizations as defendants. This includes American registrars such as Namecheap and GoDaddy, but also the government of the Kingdom of Tonga, which is linked to .to domains.

By requiring domain name registrars to take action, the Indian court orders have a global impact.

In addition to suspending the domain names within three days days, the domain name registrars are given four weeks to disclose the relevant subscriber information connected to these domains.

“[The registrars] shall lock and suspend Defendant Nos. 1 to 47 websites within 72 hours of being communicated with a copy of this Order and shall file all the Basic Subscriber Information, including the name, address, contact information, email addresses, bank details, IP logs, and any other relevant information […] within four weeks of being communicated with a copy of this Order,” the High Court wrote.

Not All Domain ‘Registrars’ Comply

While the “Dynamic+” injunction is designed to be a global kill switch, its effectiveness depends entirely on the cooperation of the domain name registrars. Since most of these are based outside of India, their compliance is not guaranteed.

By now, the 72-hour deadline to comply has long passed, so we can effectively see which registrars have taken action and which ones haven’t.

According to our analysis, it appears that most domain names have not been suspended. These pirate sites domains continue to be accessible today. Some continue running from their original domains, while others redirect to new ones, suggesting that they remain controlling their original owners.

This includes domains that are linked to Namecheap, Tucows, GoDaddy, NameSilo, Dynadot, OVH and others. The government of the Kingdom of Tonga did not comply with the Indian court order either.

As far as we can see, domains linked to the American registrar Porkbun, the UK-based WHG Hosting services, and the Lithuanian registrar Hostinger were fully suspended. Registrar.eu also put some domains on clientHold, and the one that remains accessible (animesuge.bz) is linked to Namecheap now.

It’s not unprecedented for foreign companies, including American ones, not to comply with Indian court orders. However, in this case, it is worth noting that Namecheap previously appeared to comply with similar orders from the Delhi High Court.

The non-compliance must come as a disappointment to Netflix, Warner Bros. and the others. However, they will likely be back in court for more blocking and suspension orders son enough.

All in all, it is clear that India’s High Court has a streamlined process in place that effectively orders local ISPs to block pirate sites. However, the intended global reach seems to be restricted to a few registrars, for now.

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A copy of the High Court order, issued on December 18, 2025, by Justice Tejas Karia, is available here (pdf) . The court order includes 163 unique domain names, some of which are not linked to a registrar. An overview of the 125 domains that are linked to targeted registrars and related entities is provided below. .

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