Naver Webtoon seizes 150 illegal overseas sites

South Korea’s Naver Webtoon announced on Thursday it shut down 150 illegal overseas sites, which unauthorizedly posted more than 80 webtoons in the US.

The company applied to the US court in July this year to issue subpoenas for the personal information of the operators of more than 360 illegal sites.

This subpoena is an order under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) to produce documents that identify the alleged infringer. A service provider served with a subpoena must submit the alleged infringer's email, address, and payment information.

“It is estimated that most of the operators of illegal webtoon sites have stopped their activities due to the burden of submitting personal information,” a Naver Webtoon source said. Sites that unlawfully share webtoons receive about 2.5 billion visits per year.

Write to Ji-Eun Jeong at jeong@hankyung.com