Tamil Rockers is a torrent website based in India which facilitates the illegal distribution of copyrighted material, including television shows, movies, music and videos. The site allows visitors to search for and download copyrighted material with the help of

magnet links Magnet is a URI scheme that defines the format of magnet links, a de facto standard for identifying files (URN) by their content, via cryptographic hash value rather than by their location. Although magnet links can be used in a number of cont ...

and

torrent Torrent or torrents may refer to: * A fast flowing stream Animals * Torrent duck, a species of the family Anatidae * Torrent fish * Torrent frog, various unrelated frogs * Torrent robin, a bird species * Torrent salamander, a family of sala ...

files, which facilitate

peer-to-peer Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network. They are said to form a peer-to-peer n ...

file sharing File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digital media, such as computer programs, multimedia (audio, images and video), documents or electronic books. Common methods of storage, transmission and dispersion include r ...

. It also operates multiple

Telegram Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas p ...

channels and groups with thousands of subscribers. Tamil Rockers is the tenth most popular torrent site in

TorrentFreak __NOTOC__ TorrentFreak (TF) is a blog dedicated to reporting the latest news and trends on the BitTorrent protocol and file sharing, as well as on copyright infringement and digital rights. The website was started in November 2005 by a Dutchman ...

's Top 10 Most Popular Torrent Sites of 2020 list. In India,

ISPs An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides services for accessing, using, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, non-profit, or otherwise private ...

have been ordered to block access to the website. The website continues operation by switching to a series of new web addresses. Aside from its traditional list of pirate sites, apps, and hosting providers, the movie industry group

Motion Picture Association The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the five major film studios of the United States, as well as the video streaming service Netflix. Founded in 1922 as the Motion Picture Producers and Distribu ...

(MPA) lists Tamil Rockers as one of the

notorious markets A notorious market is a website or physical market where, according to the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), large-scale intellectual property infringement takes place. Officially termed Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting a ...

History

Tamil Rockers was a

bootleg recording A bootleg recording is an audio or video recording of a performance not officially released by the artist or under other legal authority. Making and distributing such recordings is known as ''bootlegging''. Recordings may be copied and traded ...

network which was founded in 2011 and later became a public torrent website that links to pirated copies of

Indian films The Cinema of India consists of motion pictures produced in India, which had a large effect on world cinema since the late 20th century. Major centers of film production across the country include Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Ko ...

, particularly

Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia ** Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, nati ...

, in addition to Hollywood films dubbed into Indian languages along with the original English audio. On March 14, 2018, three men said to be behind the site were arrested. One of the men was believed to be the site administrator. On 23 May 2019, more members of Tamil Rockers were arrested in

Coimbatore Coimbatore, also spelt as Koyamputhur (), sometimes shortened as Kovai (), is one of the major metropolitan cities in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located on the banks of the Noyyal River and surrounded by the Western Ghats. Coimbato ...

. On October 19, 2020, the site went offline but came back online after a while; it was speculated that

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technology c ...

intervened by issuing several

DMCA The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a 1998 United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or s ...

takedown notices.

Legacy

Unofficial clones

Since the official Tamil Rockers went offline, there has been two prominent clone websites called TamilMV and Tamil Blasters, which are also been targeted by ISPs to block them. In May, 2022,

Disney Star Disney Star Private Limited is an Indian media conglomerate and a wholly owned subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company India. It is headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra. Disney Star network runs more than 70 TV channels in eight languages, reac ...

, a subsidiary of

The Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

, filed complaint with police in India, targeting Tamil Rockers, 1TamilMV, and Tamil Blasters.

In popular culture

The Tamil Rockers name has made cameo in many Tamil movies, including a Tamil movie named after the website starring

Premgi Amaren Prem Kumar Gangai Amaren (born 26 February 1979), better known as Premgi, is an Indian playback singer, composer, songwriter, actor and comedian. The son of composer and director Gangai Amaran, he often composes rap songs in Tamil cinema and i ...

released on December 31, 2021. On July 2, 2022,

SonyLIV SonyLIV is an Indian over-the-top freemium streaming platform owned by Culver Max Entertainment. SonyLIV was introduced in 2013 as the first OTT service in India. As a streaming service, it is carrying content from its local networks, includi ...

released a web series named ''Tamil Rockerz'', which is about online piracy and cybercrime, it stars

Arun Vijay Arun Vijay (born 19 November 1977), formerly known as Arun Kumar, is an Indian actor who works primarily in Tamil cinema. He also starred in a few films in Telugu, Kannada and Hindi. Born as Arun Kumar and being the only son of veteran actor ...

and

Vani Bhojan Vani Bhojan (born 28 October 1988) is an Indian actress who works in Tamil cinema. She made her Telugu film debut with ''Meeku Maathrame Cheptha'' in 2019 and her Tamil film debut with '' Oh My Kadavule'' in 2020. Early life and family Bho ...

, directed by Arivazhagan.

References

{{BitTorrent BitTorrent websites Notorious markets Indian websites Indian entertainment websites Indian film websites Tamil cinema Internet properties established in 2011 2011 establishments in India Internet censorship in India Copyright infringement Indian intellectual property law