this post was submitted on 09 Feb 2026
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Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ

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Ive thought about torrents but they require a paid vpn from what i know? I dont really want to pay, which is why im thinking about piracy because im not made of money and cant afford a vpn. Im just not sure if its possible to be safe and sail the seven seas all for free?

What would you advise i do? what did you do when starting out?

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[–] ICastFist@programming.dev 1 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

Search whatever you're looking for with yandex.com - they don't block pirate sites. Be sure to have uBlock Origin on your browser, you WILL need it. Direct Download (ddl) sites can often have 3+ redirects before the actual, real download link, so it's good to save favorites when it's only 1

For shows, animes and movies, you're better off finding streaming sites, which you can find above.

Lastly, telegram. Yes, the app. You can find several channels/groups that share stuff. I follow a couple that share IT/Gaming/Animation related courses. You can find series, animes and other stuff, too.

[–] nullptr@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

It depends where you are in the world. Some countries care more about copyright laws. Sometimes you can get away with torrenting with little to no consequences.

Otherwise, stick to direct download and streaming websites. There are a lot of great sites for movies and tv shows. They tend to come and go. Just remember to install an ad blocker. For games, you'll need to look at direct downloads. Some good links in other comments.

[–] ICastFist@programming.dev 2 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

This. I live in Brazil, I torrent often and have never received any letter from my ISP or anyone. Close to 20 years now surfing the p2p waves.

[–] MrsDoyle@sh.itjust.works 2 points 3 hours ago

I'm in the UK and have been torrenting for about that long too. I have had exactly one threatening email from my ISP, over a Hogwarts book from memory. I ignored it and exactly nothing happened. Somehow JK managed to survive, imagine that.

[–] NimbleNemesis@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 15 hours ago

Mooch off someone else's paid VPN.

[–] x550@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 17 hours ago

I2p or opendirectories or direct downloads. Id personally opt for i2p as at least you give something back.

That being said a vpn is cheap.

[–] B4DR0B0T@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

Hey, this could get you started. Its not the same but you can try "c/Archive" and/or "c/YouTube" but its not much yet :-) You can also try IRC Downloading its free no seeding needed and if you use SASL/SSL you don't need vpn. There is also something like this "Only One Petabyte and 464,392 files" of shows/movies, should be enought for you for a while =) I mean who needs torrents if you can easily download direct LOL

Only use direct downloads. For example https://rentry.org/megathread-games#direct-downloads I don't torrent, I don't use a VPN, nor pay for anything in order to pirate. Sometimes you might have to wait for slower download speeds but often times there is a mirror that will cap out my speeds of 200mb/s

[–] TheFogan@programming.dev 57 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Well first off, torrenting doesn't "require" a VPN, you may want to look up your area etc... in most of the united states, basically if you torrent without a VPN, there's a chance that your ISP will detect it and typically they will send you a letter saying "we know you downloaded _____ illegally, if we catch you again, we will cancel your service".

which depending on what you are going for (like say new releases and big name targets are what they will be watching for the most)... that could take years to even happen.

Now as far as safe, and lower risk... you could always look up pirating on the IRC... it's not the most user friendly route out there, but that's kind of the point, it's ancient technology and for the most part no one bothers to monitor it.

and then of course there's just tons of bootleg streaming sites. bottom line anything that's not peer 2 peer, is pretty much impossible for ISPs to identify what you are doing on... and thus are pretty safe.

[–] dogs0n@sh.itjust.works 14 points 1 day ago (2 children)

ISP will detect it and typically they will send you a letter saying "we know you downloaded _____ illegally, if we catch you again, we will cancel your service".

It's actually the studios that own the content you are torrenting that will seed the torrent and then collect a list of all IP addresses that connect to them, then they ask your ISP to shut your internet off.

You ISP doesn't actually care if you torrent, because if they cancel your internet they lose out on money.

[–] irotsoma@piefed.blahaj.zone 1 points 17 hours ago

Unless your ISP is a content owner, which several are now. Comcast/Xfinity is NBC for example. Plus Comcast makes a lot of profit on cable TV, so they have reason to ger people to stop. That being said, I dont know anyone who was simply downloading for personal use who got their service canceled. But it is a major risk in the IS since most ISPs have near monopolies at least over broadband speeds, so the majority have no other options.

[–] TheFogan@programming.dev 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

True, I guess the process is the studios have deals/threats to sue the ISPs if they don't do it.

Either way regardless of their reason or motives. The ISP is the one that's in charge of sending the threat and dealing the punishment, and again the key point is (again region may vary, do research on your ISP), but typically they send a warning first. So in short, if you just want to get started quickly, you can just start torrenting with no VPN (you should probably seed things for as little time as possible), and hope you can afford a VPN before you get the threatening letter, if you do get the threatening letter... then stop all peer 2 peer based piracy until you can afford to do it safer.

[–] Clent@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

There is also Usenet, access is cheap but not free.

[–] datavoid@sh.itjust.works 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Substantially more pricey than a vpn

[–] immobile7801@piefed.social 2 points 22 hours ago

Buy usenet around black friday, super cheap. I currently pay $18/yr for usenet, any useful VPN is way more expensive.

[–] lemming@anarchist.nexus 27 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Seems like a lot of people replying need to work on their reading comprehension...

Use private trackers only. Public trackers are way easier to identify you on.
Disable DHT, PeX and Local Peer Discovery in your BitTorrent client. This will prevent you connecting to random public peers.
If you're just interested in movies/TV I recommend streaming sites with an adblocker. Just so much easier and safe enough. Find sites on fmhy.net

Use private trackers only. Public trackers are way easier to identify you on.

Source on that? This is the first I've heard of it

[–] meldrik@lemmy.wtf 4 points 1 day ago
[–] wildbus8979@sh.itjust.works 24 points 1 day ago (3 children)
[–] jaschop@awful.systems 18 points 1 day ago

qBitTorrent in I2P only mode is free and safe.

It's slow and limited selection, but there's good stuff.

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[–] moosetwin@lemmy.dbzer0.com 12 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

fmhy has a beginners guide, there's lots of options that don't require torrenting

for torrenting specifically, I've been using cloudflare's vpn (1.1.1.1) without issues, though it requires a bit of setup with wireguard

[–] TheLeadenSea@sh.itjust.works 14 points 1 day ago (2 children)

You could use a free VPN like Proton if you're worried about getting caught. You can also use DNS over https to hide what sites you're visiting from being visible, and you might not even need a VPN depending on your area, as others have mentioned. I've pirated so much stuff for years and never gotten any angry letters.

[–] Ilandar@lemmy.today 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You could use a free VPN like Proton if you’re worried about getting caught.

Proton's free plan does not support P2P.

[–] mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works 2 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

I thought it just doesn't support port forwarding, and only one side of a torrent connection needs to have it

[–] loppwn@sh.itjust.works 1 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

No, proton free blocks torrent use

[–] Draconic_NEO@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 8 hours ago

How do they block it exactly? Do they block it the way most public Wifi does, or do they go an extra step and attempt to block trackers? If it's the former it's possible to bypass it, but it will limit how fast or good the torrenting experience will be.

[–] ivn@jlai.lu 6 points 1 day ago

In most country you don't risk anything by just visiting the site. But just so you know, while DoH or DoT are very good things for privacy, it's not enough to prevent your ISP form seeing the site you visit. They can still see the SNI unless the site has setup ECH but it's very rare.

[–] hesh@quokk.au 15 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Unfortunately any unencrypted file sharing, or really any unencrypted internet usage at all, carries some risk of ISPs or governments snooping on what you are doing. BitTorrent is just particularly notable because of its history and that by the nature of the protocol, you are uploading (seeding) in addition to downloading.

A good VPN is a few bucks a month and provides a lot of other benefits. It's worth considering.

[–] teft@piefed.social 14 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Find someone in your circle of friends who can give you an invite to a private tracker or use usenet. Also vpns arent necessarily “required”. It will depend on your area and your download setup.

[–] Ganbat@lemmy.dbzer0.com 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

usenet

Doesn't that require a minimum of two paid services?

[–] teft@piefed.social 4 points 1 day ago

Depends on your location, your isp, and how patient you can be. There are free providers and indexers.

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[–] noisypine 5 points 1 day ago

Check out Tribler. Its based on similar tech as the Tor network and allows for anonymous downloads and uploads. IRC is still a pretty decent option too, if a bit of work.

[–] nibbler@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 1 day ago
[–] emotional_soup_88@programming.dev 8 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

What I did, what I do and why I do it

At the beginning of the 2000's, piracy either wasn't as prevalent as it is today or it wasn't as persecuted, or a combination thereof. Which is to say, I started with DC++, Kazaa and direct downloads. No security or privacy measures. This is also when I proudly downloaded the first Pokémon movie Pokémon: The First Movie (1998), sat down with my parents to watch it and then immediately having to explain to them why Pokémon are having sex. Suffice it to say, it was some Pokémon themed hentai.

As my understanding of computers, networking and capitalism evolved - this being around the early 2010's - and especially as I had learned about the improved, albeit not perfect, anonymity of torrenting in a society with otherwise increasingly oppressive demeanor towards online integrity and piracy -, I decided to only pirate using torrent clients thenceforth. I also took a brief pause from piracy for about six years, as I moved to a jurisdiction whose laws and attitude towards privacy were not known to me. I was doing my Master's degree and thus couldn't spare the time and effort it would've taken to safely engage in piracy.

As we arrive to present day - present time (any fans here?) -, nation states' attitude towards piracy - or, rather the lobbyists' relentless pursuit to reap legal fees - but really just the overall cyber climate with all the data brokers indiscriminately collecting, profiling and selling our data to the highest bidder, I simply don't dare to be on the clearnet/internet without using a VPN, an adblocker and DNS/hosts file based filtering anymore. I would argue that the risks to the integrity of the individual is great enough to warrant these countermeasures regardless of jurisdiction, but I digress. Sure, if your jurisdiction does not criminalize piracy, be my guest, torrent without a VPN.

My current setup

A few notes on Mullvad:

  • I am using Mullvad VPN on a router so that all my traffic is encrypted, but their desktop app is also good - better in regards to customizability -, just make sure to bind your torrent client to the network interface created by the VPN app.
  • You cannot make applications reachable from the internet (aka forward ports) with Mullvad. You can still download, but you are a passive seeder, only reachable by peers that do have port forwarding enabled. (Note: a great majority of the bigger seeders/public seeding groups use so called seeding boxes whose ports are forwarded and I seed in average 8TBs per month with steady share ratios of around 8.0, so don't let this discourage you, unless maximizing your seeding contributions is what is most important to you.)

Paying nothing

As others have already pointed out, double check what laws apply in your specific jurisdiction before pirating unprotected. I haven't tried it myself, except for running two of their routers to contribute bandwidth, but file sharing in the closed network i2p is supposedly popular. However, I can neither confirm nor deny this and it is a somewhat more technical approach. All your traffic is encrypted many times over and what you do inside i2p is not visible from the clearnet. https://geti2p.net/en/

[–] zer0squar3d@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Rotf. I ALWAYS play the videos before and skip around a bit to make sure it is what it should before i show the fam. Did you atleast watch it with them after you explained the pidgys and the beedrills to them?

XD

All they knew is I'm playing a game boy game called Pokémon and that this is a movie of that game. So... XD

[–] kugmo@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)

yt-dlp and a streaming site

[–] Lag@piefed.world 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I use this one so I don't have to keep track of sites that go down:

https://www.bestfreestreaming.org/

[–] Prodigal1506@aussie.zone 4 points 1 day ago

Better to use fmhy, gives backup websites as well.

[–] GlenRambo@jlai.lu 0 points 23 hours ago

Never used a VPN. Never got a letter. Hardly heard of anyone being actually sued over downloading one movie out of the millions that do it daily...probably more likely for die driving to work.

Torrent. Install Qbittorrent and just use any Prate bay clone site.

Or SlSk (soul seek) search and download directly from a user. They may expect to see that your sharing files. It's OK to have nothing when your starting out.

Or Stremio installed on almost any TV or device and stream the content without downloading first. Kodi can do it too but it's a bit of a setup and I've found Stremio to be easier.

The first two install without issie, the last needs a guide to get the good stuff DM me and I'll send a recommended link.

I've done all three for free with no issues - beyond sometimes finding content. That said. The caviets.

The first two can get you a virus if you don't know what your doing and clicking random things. For torrenting I hear private trackers are better but I've never used one.

And the last one does, unfortunately, work better with a paid service (premoumize or real debrid). Cheapest is during black friday and pay for two years. It's the same as yearly Prime Subscription.

[–] WagnasT@piefed.world 4 points 1 day ago

yarrlist has a list of servers that are like the old fmovies, some are worse than others so use an adblocker.

[–] CallMeAl@piefed.zip 6 points 1 day ago

Mulvad is 5 euro per month for up to 5 devices. You could split it with 4 other people...

[–] wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 day ago

Decade and a half ago I torrented all the time and didn't get caught until I stupidly downloaded something from the top 100 torrents on pirate bay.

Not sure how safe torrents are now.

Never have had any issues with direct downloads and streaming. Just use your head, adblock, and virus scan your downloads (knowing that keygens or cracked exes may show as viruses).

For safest option and free: Use an up to date web browser with a good adblocker (ublock origin is the current best), stick to direct downloads using a download manager to manage the 12+ parts, and virus scan everything that you download. Download from trusted sites from the megathread. Direct download is generally safe, unless you live in one of the few countries cracking down on fitgirl repacks specifically. Then that site is off limits for you.

You can use torrents without a VPN, it's just not safe. You could be caught and the penalty will vary based off of what you're downloading, where you live, and who you use for an ISP.

[–] Grass@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 day ago

where I live last I checked even if an IP holder sends you a cease and desist or other letter you can just ingore it and they can pound sand. If its worse for your country you kinda need the vpn.

[–] hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

There's copyright infringement on one click hosters... And a loy of them offer slow, but free downloads. Some newcomers ask a friend to copy a movie from their harddisk or DVD collection... I mean piracy in general is a bit tricky for newcomers. There's some good resources linked in the sidebar... But a lot of piracy isn't exactly legal to do. And it's not really ethical to advise someone to do something that might get them in trouble... And openly recommending things is illegal in some jurisdictions. But yes. Don't do random torrents unless you know what you're doing.

Do you have a dvd/blu ray disc drive? You could go to your local library and go hog wild on their selection

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