U.S. Helps Vietnam Arrest 7 People Allegedly Involved in One of the Largest and Most Popular Free Streaming Sites for Anime

HiAnime was 1 of the largest and astir fashionable escaped streaming sites for anime until its abrupt closure earlier this year. Now, authorities successful Vietnam person arrested 7 radical allegedly progressive successful the pirate site’s operation, arsenic reported by Torrent Freak.

With a layout reminiscent of legit streaming giants similar Netflix and Crunchyroll, HiAnime offered thousands of anime titles to ticker for free. The tract saw good implicit 150 cardinal visits each month, making it a apical people for anti-piracy groups. These arrests came aft years of investigations into the piracy ringing by organizations including U.S. Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), Department of Justice, and the Alliance for Creativity and Entertainment (ACE). ACE’s members see large names similar Amazon, Netflix, Walt Disney Studios, Sony Pictures, and Paramount, to sanction a few.

In March 2026, HiAnime posted a goodbye connection successful plain substance crossed its domains earlier going dark. Now, Vietnamese authorities person arrested 4 alleged ringleaders and charged them with copyright infringement and wealth laundering successful transportation with a pirate streaming web that operated implicit 100 websites, including HiAnime. Three radical were arrested connected charges of copyright infringement only. According to the Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security's anti-corruption and economical transgression unit, the radical offered much than 26,000 unlicensed titles crossed the web of sites, allegedly generating astir $12.8 cardinal via advertizing revenue.

HiAnime had been battling against efforts to region the tract and its domains for years. The fashionable anime piracy tract was antecedently known arsenic Zoro and past Aniwatch, earlier rebranding itself to HiAnime successful 2024. Back successful 2023, ACE managed to instrumentality implicit the Zoro.to domain but not earlier the pirate tract had relocated to Aniwatch. It seems the HiAnime rebrand whitethorn person besides been made to antagonistic moves against the pirate site, arsenic it coincided with India’s blocking of respective pirate sites including Aniwatch (as besides reported by Torrent Freak).

Just days earlier HiAnime went offline successful March this year, the U.S. Trade Representatives (USTR) released its yearly reappraisal of Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting and Piracy, which namechecked HiAnime connected leafage 33. Then successful May this year, the USTR classified Vietnam arsenic a Priority Foreign Country implicit its nonaccomplishment to adequately code online piracy and launched a commercialized probe (USTR property release).

Although acknowledging the Vietnamese authorities’ erstwhile efforts to instrumentality down pirate sites operating successful the state and to apprehension the perpetrators, leafage 44 of the USTR study implied that the punishments had been excessively lax. The study made circumstantial notation to the fines and suspended sentences handed retired successful the Fmovies case: “Vietnam precocious had an uptick successful transgression prosecutions against piracy operators successful collaboration with U.S. enforcement authorities and stakeholders, which the United States hopes volition continue. However, contempt having transgression laws that supply for important fines and years of incarceration for copyright infringement, the defendants successful caller transgression prosecutions received suspended sentences and were lone ordered to wage comparatively debased fiscal penalties.”

The 7 men successful the HiAnime lawsuit are presently awaiting trial. If recovered blameworthy of the wealth laundering and copyright infringement charges, their punishment mightiness beryllium stricter than successful Vietnam’s erstwhile online piracy cases.

Photo by Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty Images.

Verity Townsend is simply a Japan-based freelance writer who antecedently served arsenic editor, contributor and translator for the crippled quality tract Automaton West. She has besides written astir Japanese civilization and movies for assorted publications.