The 'SwitchPirates' subreddit is in Nintendo's sights.
Nintendo's ongoing fight against Switch piracy has a new target in its sights — and that's the r/SwitchPirates subreddit.
As first reported by Stephen Totillo in Game File, Nintendo's recent federal court filing (dated November 21) highlights how the company is now taking aim at one of the largest hubs for Switch-related piracy chatter.
With over 200,000 members, the sizeable Reddit community is now very much in Nintendo’s crosshairs, chiefly due to being linked to alleged modder James “Archbox” Williams. He's a modder who previously ran what Nintendo describes as a “vast network of Pirate Shops”.
Nintendo's legal filing alleges that Williams, who is said to have served as a primary moderator of the r/SwitchPirates subreddit, used the platform as a way to promote pirated Switch games and related tools designed to circumvent console security.
Nintendo goes on to claim that this subreddit has played a central role in fostering Switch piracy, describing it as a place where pseudonymous users can come together and coordinate the distribution of illegal content (such as Switch ROMs).
From the filing:
“Reddit, Inc. operates a social media platform where users, often using pseudonyms, may post to different forums known as communities or ‘subreddits.’ Defendant was a primary moderator of the SwitchPirates community, under the name ‘Archbox,’ which boasted more than 190,000 members.”
The company alleges that Williams may have controlled multiple accounts within the subreddit, potentially masking the identities of others involved.
Now Nintendo is seeking the court’s approval to actually subpoena Reddit for user records. These records, if shared, could identify additional moderators or users tied to the r/SwitchPirates subreddits. Nintendo argues that these records are critical to building their case against others in the alleged piracy network.
Whether Reddit is made to comply with such a request is the next big question for this case. If granted these subpoenas could set something of a precedent for holding platforms like Reddit accountable for being home to such piracy-related conversations.
In addition to requesting records from Reddit, Nintendo's filing also makes appeals for information from other companies, including domain registrars such as Namecheap and GoDaddy, along with firms such as Cloudflare, Github, Google, and Discord.
For now, the fate of r/SwitchPirates hangs in the balance, with Nintendo seemingly poised to escalate its legal campaign against those it identifies as a promoting Switch piracy.
At time of writing, the r/SwitchPirates sub is still live, and very active. You can see the legal filing here — courtesy of Stephen Totilo.
Via: Game File
Kevin Wammer