The content industry can scratch another notch into its legal gun this week, after BitTorrent tracker TorrentSpy announced that it has voluntarily shut down as of last Monday. “We have decided on our own, not due to any court order or agreement, to bring the TorrentSpy.com search engine to an end,” reads a message that is all that remains of the beleaguered tracker. “The legal climate in the USA for copyright, privacy of search requests, and links to torrent files in search results is simply too hostile.”

“We spent the last two years, and hundreds of thousands of dollars, defending the rights of our users and ourselves … Ultimately the Court demanded actions that in our view were inconsistent with our privacy policy, traditional court rules, and International law; therefore, we now feel compelled to provide the ultimate method of privacy protection for our users - permanent shutdown.”

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