The law cracks down on scanslators and fansubbers

In recent weeks nearly a dozen manga scanslators and anime fansubbers have been arrested in Japan and Poland; while these were unrelated incidents, both stories appear to indicate a progressively harsher treatment of internet copyright pirates.

The Japanese case involved three men (one university student) who were scanning several manga anthologies days (and sometimes, even weeks) in advance of their official release dates. The scanned material included Weekly Shonen Jump – the million selling magazine that serializes the likes of Bleach and Naruto. No potential punishments for those arrested has been revealed, though obviously they have already had their hardware seized by the police.

In Poland the laws are harsher – 9 people were arrested for illegally distributing copyrighted Polish subtitle scripts that were translated to be read along side popular Hollywood movies and anime. Despite the fact that no actual video was being published by the pirates, if found guilty they still could be facing up to two years in jail.