EXPATS using the Kodi box for their TV viewing could find themselves struggling to find their favourite add-ons.
TVAddons, an unofficial library of piracy-friendly add-ons for Kodi, has seemingly been shut down. The website went offline on June 13 amid a legal battle in US federal court that has left the Kodi community reeling.
Any attempt to access the website and its extensive library of Kodi add-ons now results in a Domain Name System (DNS) error message, indicating that the site has been taken down by its creators.
TorrentFreak attempted to contact the site’s administrators via email to clarify the situation, but found the email addresses were also offline.
The add-on library, which boasted around 1,500 Kodi extensions, has also gone quiet on social media. The site’s Twitter feed has not been updated for over a week and its Facebook page has been removed.
TVAddons’ radio silence is likely linked to a lawsuit filed by US broadcast company Dish Network.
The lawsuit in question directly targeted TVAddons, as well as Kodi add-on Zem TV, with Dish Network accusing the two of enabling copyright infringement of its on-demand and livestream services. The network is reportedly asking for $150,000 in damages.
ZemTV stopped working last week and the TVAddOns website has now followed. It comes after Phoenix, another popular add-on was shut down.
TVAddons’ closure, whether temporary or permanent, appears to represent another victory in the ongoing legal crackdown on both piracy friendly add-ons that abuse the open-source Kodi software and the retail of “fully loaded Kodi boxes”.
In March, 40 million users reportedly accessed its extensive library in a single month, and many Kodi pirates rely on the site for crucial add-on updates.
Although Kodi is not illegal and carries no media content itself, by remaining open source for third party developers, Kodi has found itself under increasing pressure from anti-piracy groups to crackdown on illegal streaming add ons.
ZemTV was removed from the TVAddons library as soon as it was named in the lawsuit and One242415 – the developer behind Navi-X, Phoenix and his own add-on – also announced that his sources will stop working in the coming days.
ZemTV rose to prominence as a reliable source of live TV streams from around the world.
Phoenix, on the other hand, offered access to TV shows, movies and live sport, which led it to becoming one of the banner add-ons advertised by retailers selling “fully-loaded” Kodi boxes.
In a statement on the TVAddons forum, Phoenix developer Cosmix confirmed the closure. “In light of current events we have decided to close down Phoenix. This is not something that was easy for us to do; we have all formed a bond that cannot be broken as a team and have a HUGE support base that we are thankful of.”
The news came as a shock to many add-on developers, most of whom release their software as a hobby, with no financial motive. A potential lawsuit that can run to hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages clearly takes away most of the fun.
This could very well explain why several add-ons have shut down over the past 48 hours. While the lawsuit isn’t specifically named in most cases, there appears to be a direct connection.
Elsewhere, Amazon, Facebook and eBay all announced plans to ban the sale of ‘fully loaded’ Android TV boxes (i.e. hardware sold with the illegal add-ons pre-installed) on their respective marketplaces.
This along with the addons listed below will be another blow to users who were defying content providers who charge extortionate fees to access content, causing users to seek out other options.
ZemTV and Phoenix are just two Kodi add ons which have or face closure. Here is the full list of closed or closing Kodi add ons:
Phoenix (closed)
DOJO Streams (Closing)
F.t.f.a (closed)
Bamf (closed)
Zem (closed live tv – VOD available)
Deliverence (closed)
One128 (closed)
Reaper (closed)
Cerburus (closed)
Just for him (closed)
Les be friends (closed)
Mporn (closed)
News12 (closed)
Silent hunter (content moved)
Ccloud (speculation)
Salts (speculation)
BOB (issues with NAN site it’s not closed)
Zen (issues with NAN site it’s not closed)
Skynet (being phased out)
Evolve (live tv and sport gone – rest working)
SRTVHUB (being taken over)
UK Turks (live Streams taken down)
Expats across Turkey and further afield were affected back in May when FilmOn pulled the plug on free streaming. FilmOn stopped providing its free SD service and moved completely to a subscription based model after a legal defeat in the US courts.