Popular BitTorrent site KickassTorrents (KAT) is no longer, following the arrest of its alleged founder and seizure of its domains by the United States Government.

Artem Vaulin, 30, of Kharkiv, Ukraine, was arrested in Poland on behalf of U.S. authorities on one count of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement, one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering and two counts of criminal copyright infringement.

The Department of Justice is now in the process of requesting Vaulin’s extradition.

According to a criminal complaint filed in the U.S. District Court in Chicago, KAT enabled users to illegally reproduce and distribute hundreds of millions of copies of copyrighted motion pictures, video games, television programs, musical recordings and other electronic media, collectively valued at more than $1 billion.

The filing also claims that the site received more than 50 million unique monthly visitors and was the 69th most visited website online.

“Vaulin is charged with running today’s most visited illegal file-sharing website, responsible for unlawfully distributing well over $1 billion of copyrighted materials,” United States Assistant Attorney General Caldwell said in a statement.  “In an effort to evade law enforcement, Vaulin allegedly relied on servers located in countries around the world and moved his domains due to repeated seizures and civil lawsuits.  His arrest in Poland, however, demonstrates again that cybercriminals can run, but they cannot hide from justice.”

Trail

The arrest of Vaulin and closure of KAT came following an investigation that followed a trail left behind by Vaulin.

It starts with an IRS agent purchasing advertising on the site in March 2016 at the rate of $300 a day; a KAT representative provided details on a Latvian bank account for payment.

Five days later the same agent attempted to purchase more advertising, but was told that the cheaper ads were sold out; alternatively he could buy an ad at between $1,000 to $3,200 per day, and was then provided the details of a bank account in Estonia.

That was mistake number one: Estonia and the United States have a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty that allowed U.S. investigators to obtain those bank records.

The investigators then traced the historical hosting records for the site and found, incredibly, that it was hosted in Chicago until January 2016, and also used a Canadian service, with the records of both easy to obtain.

Where Vaulin ultimately came unstuck though, was his use of social media and Apple email accounts; investigators were able to link the IP address used for Vaulin’s email account as the same IP address used to maintain the KAT Facebook page, and ultimately other KAT related activities.

In the end, it could be said that Vaulin was either incredibly blasé about running the site, or incredibly stupid for not making efforts to protect his identity.

If found guilty, Vaulin faces five years in prison on each copyright and conspiracy charge, and 20 years in prison on the money laundering charge.

Image credit: KickassTorrents.