A joint global law enforcement operation said today it has brought down a large online piracy group that distributed movies online before their official release.

The operation, which involved law enforcement agencies in 18 countries, including the U.S. Department of Justice and the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation, targeted the ring leaders of a group known as Sparks.

Three members of the group were indicted and two arrested. George Bridi, a U.K. national was arrested in Cyprus, while Janaton Correa was arrested in Kansas. The third member of the group, Norwegian citizen Umar Ahmad, remains at large. The U.S. government is seeking Bridi’s extradition.

The trio, along with others linked to Sparks, are alleged to have been active in facilitating online piracy since 2011. The group is alleged to obtain pre-release copies of movies fraudulently ahead of their release dates, then cracked the digital rights protection of the movies for distribution on peer-to-peer networks, torrent networks and streaming websites.

According to the agencies, the group obtained copyrighted DVDs and Blu-ray discs from wholesale distributors in advance by making various misrepresentations to distributors concerning the reasons they were obtaining the discs. Ahmad and Bridi are said to have arranged for the discs to be picked up, mailed or delivered from distributors in Manhattan, Brooklyn and New Jersey to other members of the group, including Correa. The three then used software to circumvent copyright protections on the discs and reproduced movies for further distribution online.

Suggesting the group was certainly bold in its endeavors, not only did the members tag their releases but also uploaded photographs of the discs in their original packaging to demonstrate that the reproduced content originated from authentic discs.

While not giving an exact number, the indictment claims that the group distributed “nearly every movie released by major production studios” as well as television shows. “The Sparks Group has caused tens of millions of dollars in losses to film production studios,” the statement from Justice Department said.

All three have been charged with copyright infringement conspiracy, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison. Bridi has also been charged with wire fraud and conspiracy to transport stolen property interstate, with the charges having a maximum of 20 years and five years in prison, respectively.

Servers used by the group have also been taken offline in countries Canada, Czechia, Denmark, France, Germany, Latvia, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the U.K. according to Europol.

The group’s name may not be well-known outside piracy circles, but the group is linked to various other groups going by the names of Geckos, Drones, Rovers and Sprinter. All the groups collectively are known as “The Scene.”

According to TorrentFreak, The Scene is in panic mode following the arrests and “people were running for cover.” The one unarrested member of the group, Ahmad, is said to be causing considerable concern among pirates because of his alleged reach within the The Scene.

Photo: Pikist