📰 New article from TorrentFreak
Meta Must Face Adult Film Piracy Lawsuit as Court Denies Dismissal
https://torrentfreak.com/meta-must-face-adult-film-piracy-lawsuit-as-court-denies-dismissal/
Meta thought it could dodge a lawsuit by claiming its network was just a victim of rogue employees. Unfortunately for the tech giant, a federal judge in California isn’t buying that excuse. Strike 3 Holdings and Counterlife Media accused Meta of using adult films to train its AI models via BitTorrent, and Meta tried to dismiss the case by arguing the IP address evidence was meaningless without proof of central orchestration.
Judge Eumi K. Lee rejected that motion in a sharp 16-page order, letting all infringement claims proceed. The court found the idea that multiple corporate IPs coincidentally downloaded identical files—ranging from explicit adult content to Teen Titans and out-of-order episodes of Ted Lasso—to be absurd. The patterns were too consistent, suggesting algorithmic keyword scraping rather than random human error.
Why does this matter? It establishes that simply copying content via BitTorrent is infringement, regardless of whether it ends up in an AI model. It also sidesteps the Cox Communications defense, as Meta allegedly built tools specifically to facilitate this torrenting. The case moves into discovery, with a jury trial set for February 2028. Meta’s “it wasn’t us” defense has officially stalled; now it’s time for the hard evidence.