KissAnime, the popular pirate anime streaming site, has been completely shut down after eight years of operation. The lights were turned off after the site received a mass amount of copyright claims.
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The shutdown was first announced on August 14th in a post on the /r/KissAnime subreddit simply titled “Rest in peace.” The post simply read, “Kissanime died between 10:00 PM and 10:20 PST on August 14, 2020”.
This turn of events was later confirmed by the KissAnime support team via their Discord channel. Their official KissAnimeSupport account explained that, “All files are taken down by copyright owners. KissManga and KissAnime will be closed forever. Thank you for your supports ☹ Thank you for those years.”
Visitors to the KissAnime webpage are now being greeted by a short message that reads, “All files are taken down by copyright owners. The site will be closed forever. Thank you for your supports. Thank you for those years.”
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Given that the recent legal action against KissAnime also targeted sister site KissManga, the shutdown most likely comes as a result of Japan’s recently revised anti-piracy laws. The laws were updated in June 2020 to specifically target pirated print material such as manga, magazines, and academic texts.
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Japanese legislators also sought to crack down on, “”leech website” that provide users hyperlinks to download so-called torrent files of pirated materials.
Though the ban will be fully enacted on January 1st of next year, the restrictions on leech sites are set to come into effect in October 2020.
Various alternatives to KissAnime remain active across the internet; though their fates remain to be seen in the face of Japan’s war on piracy. It’s unknown how they’ll fare with this new law.
The site will be missed by the massive amounts of viewers who used its services. This includes Funimation, who earlier this year, used the site to acquire screenshots of Tokyo Ghoul: RE for use in a promotional tweet.
What is your take on the death of KissAnime? Will another alternative take it’s place?