Overview

AniWave Shutdown, also known as 2024 Anime Piracy Sites Shutdown, refers to a series of pirate anime streaming websites shutting down, especially Aniwave (formerly 9Anime), one of the most well-known illegal streaming platforms for such content. Other popular anime-related websites were also shut down in the event, including Fboxz.to, Anix.to, AnimeSuge, Zoroxtv and many others that shared the .to domain suffix (the country code top-level domain for the Kingdom of Tonga). The controversy was widely discussed on social media in late August 2024, as netizens mourned the shutdown of the websites and posted memes or theories about who was behind the action, many criticizing Crunchyroll.

Background

On August 27th, 2024, the X^[1] page @MangaMoguraRE revealed that several popular anime piracy streaming sites were shut down and had gone offline, including AnimeSuge, AnimeWave (formerly known as 9Anime) and many more. The tweet (seen below) amassed over 34,000 likes and 7,700 reposts in a few hours (seen below).

X^[4] user @brndnreys replied to @MangaMoguraRE's tweet that day with a full list of anime piracy sites that were shut down during the same wave, which included filmoflix.to, papadustream.to, animesuge.to, vidsrc2.to, flix2day.to, 2flix.to, theflixtor.to, mov2day.to, fboxz.to, cinezone.to, aniwave.to, anix.to and zoroxtv.to. The post (seen below) amassed more than 2,000 likes and 30 reposts in a few hours.

Developments

According to an article posted by the Torrent Freak^[2] website on August 27th, 2024, AniWave.to, formerly known as 9Anime, serviced a "mind-blowing 170 million visits a month," and now a message posted on the site suggests, "that with the arrival of improved legal alternatives, now is an opportune time to stop pirating."

The full message on AniWave's former website was screenshotted by X^[3] user @lvrdsean that same day, who posted, "This is my 9/11," amassing roughly 530 likes and 30 reposts in a few hours. A video of Wiz Khalifa's "See You Again" notably played in the background of AniWave's website.

Also on August 27th, 2024, an article posted by the CBR^[5] website noted that almost all the anime piracy websites affected by the shutdown shared the domain suffix .to, which is the country code top-level domain for the Kingdom of Tonga.

AniWave Staff Response

Shortly after AniWave's website was shut down, the page's official Reddit^[7] channel uploaded a statement about the current situation of the website, writing that the site's owner "has always been pretty disconnected from us, rarely giving us a heads up or any information in advance." The full message (seen below), written by Redditor Sorrow-san, amassed more than 800 upvotes and 350 comments in a few hours.

Online Reactions

AniWave and other anime piracy shutdowns quickly became a viral topic on the internet, sparking memes and a viral debate theorizing who's behind the massive takedowns. For example, on August 26th, 2024, X^[6] user @DynamoSuperX posted the Pirates of the Caribbean meme of a captain walking down the stairs while his ship is destroyed around him, captioning it as all the anime websites affected by the shutdowns (seen below), which amassed over 19,000 views and 1,200 likes in a few hours.

TikTokers also reacted to the massive anime-related website shutdowns, as user @zethie00^[8] uploaded a video on August 27th, 2024, with the text overlay of his reaction, writing, "It's over every anime website is gone." The video (seen below) amassed more than 143,000 plays and 22,000 likes in a few hours.

Search Interest

External References