The largest manga piracy site in the world, BATO.TO, and “approximately 60 related sites” have been shut down, following a joint operation between the Shanghai Public Security Bureau of China and Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
As spotted by NHK, this news comes via a report from the Japanese Content Overseas Distribution Organisation, also known as CODA, indicating that the home of a man “alleged to have operated the world’s largest manga piracy site” had been searched. Although the suspect in question, who was arrested on suspicion of copyright infringement, was detained on November 19, 2025, CODA’s report states that the BATO group of sites “continued limited operation” until January 19, at which point they confirmed that “all 60” of BATO.TO sites had shut down.
The statement notes that the 60 sites combined pulled in an estimated 350 million visits in May 2025 alone, and alleges that the “resulting economic impact” supposedly “amounts to approximately 770 billion yen.” That’s just shy of 5 billion USD.
This absurdly large loss matches up with a recently published report from Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, which estimated that Japanese anime, manga, and video game piracy resulted in 5.7 trillion yen (roughly 37 billion USD) of damage in 2025. CODA states that their investigation “was initiated following requests from Japanese publishers,” including several prominent video game publishers such as Square Enix and Kadokawa Corporation, the latter of whom entered into a “strategic capital and business alliance” with Sony in December 2024.
CODA also states that China Literature Limited, a subsidiary of Tencent Holdings, cooperated with the investigation “as part of its international collaboration efforts to strengthen the effectiveness of anti-piracy measures.”
Funnily enough, the official BATO.TO mod team noted on the r/Batoto subreddit that a new clone of the site popped up on January 20, a day after “the closure of all 60 sites had been confirmed” by CODA. The original BATO.TO mod team notes in their post that they “have not been in contact with the original developers, have not been notified that the new site is legitimate, and cannot confirm any claims circulating online.”
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