Why are torrents used for pirated stuff?

[Jordan]

I'm doing research on internet piracy, and I wanted to know, why is so much stuff in torrents pirated. Are they more secure? Or is there some other reason as to why they are so popular for use in illegal downloading of stuff?

[Austin]

Well, torrents are P2P, so it is the networking equivalent of taking a USB with a file from a friends computer and sticking it in your computer. They are a little harder to track than a sever hosted download, but the government can still see whats being downloaded and who's doing.

[dewcoons]

A torrent is a program that allows people to share files located on their computers with other people. It is also called Peer To Peer files sharing (P2P)

The alternative is to create a web site and then post the file on the web site for download.

If you were to create a web site and put illegal content on the site, you would be slapped with a zillion dollar law suite with 60 seconds of hosting the site.

With P2P sharing, you remain anonymous, you have no cost for setting up or maintaining a web site, you can go on and off line with your sharing whenever you want, etc. So it is much easier and quicker to share using a P2P model then creating a web site. (Whether the content is legal or not.)

If you are doing illegal uploading, of course you want to use a method that makes its hard for them to track you down.

Although today the illegal sharing is shifting. The torrent (and other P2P models) are being replaced with "Skydrive" and similar cloud storage sites where you can upload all kinds of content (including copyrighted material) and then give the people you want to share it with access to your drive. No one else can see it. The music/movie industry can not track it. And you can still share with reduced risk of being caught.

[Jim]

The reason so many people are doing it is because the odds of getting caught is currently relatively minor. It's not so much that it's secure, as much as it is that it's there's so MANY people doing it that trying to crack down on it is an overwhelming task.

Why are so many torrents pirated material? Because that's what people want. Just about everybody loves getting stuff for free instead of paying for it.

[Jazz]

P2P is more secure than just downloading from a website.