The sites may be gone but the demand is still there. What we do know is that millions of pirates will have to find a new favorite site to stream anime or view manga.

Whether this had an immediate impact on today’s actions is unknown. The shutdowns come shortly after Japan passed amendments to its copyright law to criminalize manga piracy as well as indexing or linking sites, which don’t host content. There is a more recent development that may have played a role as well. Three years ago, for example, anime distributor FUNimation obtained a subpoena from a US Court, hoping to identify KissAmine’s operators. This isn’t new, both sites have been targeted before. The sites don’t elaborate on the reason for the shutdown but the messages imply that there was pressure from copyright holders. Thank you for your supports,” the updated message reads. “All files are taken down by copyright owners. And indeed, a few hours later, both sites reported that they are permanently closing their doors, adding that all files have been removed. KissAnime started trending on Twitter this afternoon where many fans feared the worst. We will make more announcement after we have the decision,” the message read. “Our beta servers have been taken down by copyright holders, this could lead to the close of the website. KissManga returned a ‘maintenance’ message and on KissAnime an even more worrying notice appeared. A few hours ago both sites started to show alarming signs. That reign appears to have come to an end today. According to piracy tracking company, KissAnime is the most visited pirate site in the world, beating even the mighty Pirate Bay.

and are two of the largest sites in the anime and manga niches.īoth have an audience of millions of people.

Kissmanga