Anna’s Archive Owes $340 Million, Lost Several Domains, but It’s Still Online

[Ernesto Van der Sar]

Mid August, shadow library Anna's Archive faced extended downtime, which had many regular visitors concerned.

These worries didn't come out of nowhere as the site has been under quite a bit of legal pressure in recent months.

Lawsuit Takes Domains Offline

In January, the site lost its flagship .org domain. Initially it wasn't clear what was behind this action but unsealed court records eventually connected it to a lawsuit filed by music companies. This case was a direct response to a Spotify scrape Anna's Archive announced a few weeks earlier.

The music companies obtained an injunction from a U.S. federal court to go after the site's domain names. This took out not only the .ORG domain but also the .SE domain, as well as the .PM and .VG domains that were put in place as backups.

Anna's Archive eventually landed on .GL, .PK, and .GD domains, which remain active today. These are connected to registrars and registries based outside the United States that, apparently, do not comply with U.S. court orders.

Two Lawsuits, $340 Million

The music industry injunction also came with a substantial default judgment that was handed down in April. This includes a $322 million default judgment against the unknown operators of Anna's Archive, who failed to show up in court.

Anna's Archive

This judgment was soon followed by a similar request from a group of major book publishers, including Penguin Random House, Elsevier, and HarperCollins, who sued the shadow library at a New York federal court.

That case also resulted in a default judgment, with a damages award that is smaller, but still substantial at $19.5 million. In addition, the court also issued an injunction targeting Anna's Archive's domain registrars and registries.

'Coordinated Attack'

With this backdrop, it is no surprise that legal troubles came to mind when the site became unreachable earlier this month. However, this time around, the threat appears to have come from elsewhere.

After the site came back online, the official AnnaArchivist account attributed it to a coordinated attack by an unnamed party.

"Apologies for the issues. We suspect a coordinated attack. We've mitigated the attack vectors…" the message read, while noting that memberships already include one to two extra days per month to account for downtime.

Message from AnnaArchivist on Reddit

Theoretically, an attack can also come from a rogue anti-piracy group, but there's no evidence for that. A scam or phishing operation, which tries to cash in on Anna's Archive search traffic, is another option. Neither is confirmed.

What Options Are Left?

Looking more broadly at the enforcement action that has taken place over the past months, we see that U.S. courts have run into their jurisdictional borders on the Internet.

This likely comes as a disappointment for rightsholders, but it also offers a clear takeaway.

U.S. courts can't reach domains registered beyond their jurisdiction. That's likely to increase calls for site-blocking legislation, a measure the industry has long favored and that remains high on the political agenda in the United States.

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

 

[lnx]

After the site came back online, the official AnnaArchivist account attributed it to a coordinated attack by an unnamed party.

We all know who was behind the attack, retribution for domains they can't get to...rightsholders doing illegal things, tsk tsk

Sticky Thread 'New Annas Archive Domain'

Feb 6, 2026

annas-archive.gl

• lnx
• Replies: 13
• Forum: Link Collection

• 

 

[leeuniverse]

When are these people going to get it that they need to "prove" ACTUAL LOSS.....
I've likely downloaded a MILLION Dollars at least worth of Software, Movies, Music etc. the last some 25+ YEARS...
Now, I dare them to show in court that I could have "bought" any more than 0.0000001% of it. And even that I really couldn't have "bought", because I actually needed the money for more important things.
I've been POOR that entire time... even when I had more money, I was still poor, and shouldn't have been spending it on Digital property.

Sharing Downloads are the "Modern Library".... People who use a Library don't "pay" for using it.
This however is the "Digital Age", so Sharing is today's Library for people... Sure, there can be on rare occasion someone who uses an actual Library that they can "buy" what they are using for free.
It's exactly the same with the Digital Library that is Sharing.... Sometimes a person could and even DOES BUY the item. But as a standard Rule, we CANNOT AFFORD what we are using, just like with a Traditional Library.
Which is WHY we engage in Sharing, WHY people have used a Traditional Library. When Library's were created, the Book Industry feared Author's would go out of business. But they didn't.
Likewise, Sharing doesn't stop Digital property creators from making money. If anything it often makes them money.

So, if they ever go after me, "Where there is no 'actual loss', there can be no actual crime". Law is supposed to be based on Men's Rea and Actus Reus.

• Prove where there was actual loss, not just a made up number from downloading something, which uses someone else's money btw to even get it.
• Further, prove the loss when all these downloads are also "Free Advertising".
• Prove the loss when there are "experts" created using these products, which then creates future purchasers, etc.

All these factors, prove the loss....

Further, I can understand that there IS actual loss when it comes to "Piracy" in which the product is "Sold".
However, the "user" is STILL not to blame. If anyone is, it's the Digital property owners, because they refuse to Sell their product in Country's at a rate that the people can actually afford.
I saw Pirates for example in Singapore, literally burn disks, and sell them in an actual standard Public MALL.... Clearly THEY were able to make money from this, and thus so could have the Digital property owners.
The problem is, they simply never had the will to do it.... so, they LOSE OUT of the money that they could have made, by simply refusing to price things according to the area people live, and then blame the users, instead of themselves.

Yes, SELLING someone else's property SHOULD be a crime. And yes, Pirates have blame, but they are offering a "need" engaging in Capitalism, corrupt yes, but meeting a NEED that YOU aren't.
Think on how YOU the Digital property owner is creating that situation.... You don't blame the user who simply goes to the cheapest source they can afford.

 

[bllblk]

--"I dare them to show in court that I could have "bought" any more than 0.0000001% of it."

Ha ha ha.... -Good point.