Publishing piracy is accelerating: While most content categories showed declines, publishing infringement increased 4.3% year-over-year, driven primarily by unauthorized manga distribution (70% of all publishing piracy) and the rise of fan-translated content arriving faster than official releases.

Streaming remains the dominant target: Television and streaming content account for nearly half of all copyright infringement globally, with the fragmentation of streaming services across multiple platforms creating accessibility gaps that drive users toward unauthorized sources.

One-third of Americans admit to recent piracy: According to CordCutting.com's March 2024 survey of 988 American adults, 33% admitted to illegally accessing TV shows or movies in the past 12 months, while nearly half (50%) acknowledged pirating content at some point in their lives.

Video piracy causes the greatest economic damage: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce's 2023 report identifies digital video piracy as responsible for between $29 billion and $71 billion in annual economic losses, with the wide range reflecting different calculation methodologies and the difficulty of quantifying indirect impacts.

Music piracy creates a $12.5 billion hole in the economy: According to the Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) study commissioned by the RIAA, sound recording piracy costs the U.S. economy $12.5 billion in total output annually, along with 71,060 jobs and $2.7 billion in worker earnings.

The cost of subscriptions drives infringement: In the CordCutting.com study, 36% of content pirates cited interest in a specific show without wanting to pay for a full subscription, while 35% said subscription services are simply too expensive.

The U.S. leads global infringement despite robust legal options: Despite having more legal streaming options than any other country, the United States accounts for 12.33% of all global piracy visits, 26.7 billion annually.

Emerging markets show high piracy rates: Countries like Indonesia (5.60%), Vietnam (3.44%), and India (8.12%) demonstrate elevated piracy rates, often correlated with lower per-capita income.

Publishing piracy concentrates in Asia-Pacific: For manga and digital publishing specifically, the geographic distribution shifts dramatically, with Indonesia (10.37%), Russia (7.34%), and Vietnam (6.20%) ranking as the top three countries.

Google processes 14,000 times more copyright requests than 15 years ago: The volume of DMCA takedown requests submitted to Google has exploded from approximately 250,000 URLs in 2009 to 3.5 billion pages processed in 2024.

Enforcement success varies dramatically by platform: While services claim to remove content within 24-48 hours, the average takedown timeframe remains around 10 business days. Some platforms respond within hours (Google for search results), while others take up to 30 days (TikTok).

Content creators increasingly take enforcement into their own hands: The rise of individual creators submitting takedown notices, exemplified by 2,994 individual OnlyFans creators submitting requests totaling 2.1 million URLs, demonstrates that traditional enforcement mechanisms through publishers and labels no longer capture the full scope of copyright protection needs in the creator economy.

The music industry solved piracy through accessibility: Music piracy's 18.6% decline year-over-year demonstrates what happens when legal alternatives are affordable, convenient, and comprehensive. Spotify, Apple Music, and similar services have successfully converted pirates into subscribers by offering reasonable pricing and near-universal catalog access.

Publishing faces an unsolved piracy crisis: Unlike music and video, publishing piracy is accelerating, with visits rising to 66.4 billion annually. The dominance of manga (70% of publishing piracy) reveals a systematic problem: fan communities translate and distribute content faster than official publishers can localize titles for international markets.

Individual creators bear the heaviest burden: While major studios and labels have legal departments and automated enforcement systems, independent creators, particularly on platforms like OnlyFans, Patreon, and YouTube, often lack resources to combat infringement effectively. Studies show these creators can increase revenue by 40-60% when using professional content protection services.