13 Aug 2015, 5:25 pm
The City of London Police's Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU) said that it had seen a 73% decrease in advertising from "the UK's top ad spending companies" on such sites since launching a campaign to cut the revenue operators of copyright infringing sites receive from advertising in September 2013.
PIPCU said that adverts for cars, food and drink products and from real estate industry have now "almost entirely stopped appearing on pirate sites". PIPCU said it developed a new partnership with the Gambling Commission earlier this year and that from March to June there was a 36% decline in the number of gambling ads that appeared on copyright infringing websites.
"The appearance of adverts from established brands on illegal websites lends sites a look of legitimacy," PIPCU said. "Therefore a decrease in advertising from reputable brands will help consumers realise these sites are neither official nor legal."
Central to the PIPCU operation to cut advertising on pirate sites is an 'infringing website list' that contains a list of copyright infringing websites first identified by rights holders and then "evidenced and verified" as such by PIPCU. Businesses involved in the sale of digital advertising can access this list so as to "cease advert placement" on those sites.