KAT – which distributes pirated films, video games, television programmes and music – is estimated to be the 69th most frequently visited website on the internet, according to a Justice Department statement.
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The U.S. Department of Homeland Security initially uncovered information about Vaulin by tracing the IP addresses used to host the KickassTorrents domains, according to a 48-page criminal complaint.
The U.S. government will now attempt to do to Vaulin what it has for the last four years been trying with Kim Dotcom, the leader of Megaupload, who was indicted on similar grounds and is still fighting extradition efforts. It is estimated that Kickass Torrents alone has cost artists over $1 billion, and raked in over $17 million in revenue just from advertisements on the site. Vaulin consistently managed to avoid the legal noose closing around him by changing his website address numerous times, registering it in places such as the Philippines, Tonga, and even Somalia before finally ending up in Costa Rica, his final destination.
The data showed the person was using a me.com e-mail address which is owned by Apple. They also found emails about the illegal-filing sharing site’s operations in the inbox of the account he allegedly used to make the iTunes purchases.
To secretly run KickassTorrents, Vaulin established a front company in Ukraine called Cryptoneat.
KAT started in 2008 and operated in some 30 languages, attracting more than 50 million unique viewers a month and generating up to $22 million in advertising revenue each year, the complaint said.
USA investigators have identified other individuals associated with KickassTorrents, but none of them were named in the complaint.
The move comes with U.S. officials in a long battle to extradite the head of Megaupload, a major piracy site shuttered by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 2012.
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