ESA annual report highlights anti-piracy focus

The Entertainment Software Association served 3.4m takedown notices for copyright infringement in 2012, according to a recently released annual report from the organization.

The report states that anti-piracy efforts last year assisted in removing nearly 100k Google links containing infringed game files, adding that the average duration of time it took for flagged files to be removed during the period was down 10 per cent from the year prior.

Brazil, Canada, Hong Kong, Korea, Mexico and Singapore were among the regions where piracy was most prevalent during the period, with the ESA generating takedowns of 31 websites engaged in infringing activity – over half of which were targets of the Brazilian anti-piracy program.

Polygon also noted that five major US enforcement actions pertaining to cases involving hundreds of pirated Wii and Xbox 360 games took place in 2011, which could partly explain America’s absence from ESA’s top offenders list last year.