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is pirate bay illegalThe Pirate Bay is a well-known (and perhaps infamous) website where users can upload and exchange files. While you may have heard about some of the more negative headlines about The Pirate Bay, millions of users continue to torrent every day.

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Last Updated: 30 March, 2020, EST


Using The Pirate Bay can be a stressful experience. It can even cause physical and mental damage.

How do you ask? Here are six reasons why downloading files from The Pirate Bay can jeopardize your health and your well-being. That said, there is a solution  that can help minimize some of these risks and help you use The Pirate Bay safely.

Reason #1:

Most obviously, becoming a user of The Pirate Bay can jeopardize your health and well-being because of the legal risks that are associated with the platform.

Even if you are somewhat familiar with The Pirate Bay, you are likely familiar with the legal troubles that have accompanied The Pirate Bay since its inception. Even though downloading a torrent itself isn’t illegal, often, Pirate Bay users are exchanging and downloading copyrighted files, whether that is the latest blockbuster movie or a new album from your favorite artist.

In nearly every jurisdiction around the world, it is illegal for any internet users to download unsanctioned copyrighted material. If you are caught illegally downloading copyrighted material, you can face a variety of sanctions, from your internet service provider sending you a warning letter and throttling your internet connection to local law enforcement implementing hefty fines—or even prison to use pirates bay

These potential penalties can cause massive headaches and stress if you are the target of your internet service provider or local government.

Reason #2:

Next, using The Pirate Bay can jeopardize the health of your computer.

Using a VPN or even the Tor browser can help protect you and your computer from your internet service provider and others. But that said, your computer can still be at risk due to the files that you are torrenting or the pirate bay legal

For example, if you download a movie on The Pirate Bay, you may quickly discover that the file you downloaded contains a virus, Trojan, or keylogger. Therefore, one simple decision to enjoy a particular movie can result in a nightmare of a compromised computer or even stolen information.

Because of this, you will need to be extremely careful when downloading files from The Pirate Bay. Equipping your computer with a strong antivirus program will also be a smart step.

Reason #3:

From the health of your computer, using The Pirate Bay can harm your productivity. With so much content available at your fingertips, you may feel like you are a kid in a candy store.

Again, we do not condone any illegal downloading of copyrighted material. That said, when arriving at the homepage of The Pirate Bay, you will quickly discover that there is a wealth of content available for download. If you don’t control your behavior on The Pirate Bay, you will end up with a large amount of media that you need to consume. Whether you want to devote more time to your work or even your partner, content you collect from The Pirate Bay will take up more and more of your time.

Reason #4:

Next, you may be subject to harassment by becoming a user of The Pirate Bay. By downloading a certain file from The Pirate Bay, you may receive messages from so-called copyright trolls. Copyright trolls are people (or even corporate entities) that enforce copyrights that they own.

What often occurs is that a copyright troll will send you a letter, arguing that by downloading a particular file, you have violated the troll’s copyright. How you choose to respond to the troll is up to you. Ultimately, however, by downloading a file from The Pirate Bay, there is a risk that you will be subject to harassment by copyright trolls.

Reason #5:

Moving on from this type of annoying harassment, using The Pirate Bay can lead to hours and hours of frustration. Upon first hearing about The Pirate Bay, your mind may have immediately leaped to this grand vision of being able to quickly and easily download any file that you could conceive.

The reality is much more complicated. Depending on where you live, you may find out that you cannot even access The Pirate Bay in your home country. If you are not technologically adept, you will need to learn a vast array of new concepts and terms, from leeching and seeding to determining the best BitTorrent client software for you. These are just some of the initial obstacles that you will encounter when starting out with The Pirate Bay.

In other words, becoming a competent user of The Pirate Bay takes a significant investment of time. Depending on your objectives, this investment may or may not be worth it. But if you do decide to take on this task, you will need to educate yourself on The Pirate Bay in order to use The Pirate Bay safely and effectively.

Reason #6:

Finally, becoming a user of The Pirate Bay may make you more paranoid. This is for many of the reasons that we outlined above. Since its inception, The Pirate Bay has been the focal point of regulators, local governments, internet service providers, and copyright trolls. Even if you think you are downloading a file that is not copyright protected, you are also at risk of downloading a file that contains malicious software.

Thus, by using The Pirate Bay, you are accepting a trade-off. On one hand, by using The Pirate Bay, you have access to a wealth of files and digital media at your fingertips. It almost seems too good to be true. But on the flip side, becoming a Pirate Bay user means you are accepting certain types of risk—especially if you choose to illegally download copyrighted files.

Whether you are willing to accept that risk is up to you. However, if you do opt to become a Pirate Bay user, it is inevitable that you will feel more paranoid (however slight) when using the platform.


How You Can Protect Yourself

So considering these negative effects of using The Pirate Bay, what can you do to feel better when using the platform?

One of the most significant remedies is to make sure that you are not illegally downloading copyrighted media. But beyond that, we seriously recommend that you consider using a virtual private network (“VPN”) when using The Pirate Bay. A VPN is a tool that can help you protect your IP address from internet service to download from piratebay

download from thepiratebayFor instance, a VPN like NordVPN is a well-respected VPN that provides military-grade encryption when you are using the internet. Because you will want to use a VPN that protects its customer records, you may want to consider NordVPN, as it has a strict no logs policy. It even has an automatic kill switch so that your records are never exposed for even one second.

Regardless of the VPN that you use, browsing The Pirate Bay with a VPN can provide a significant amount of protection from actors like copyright trolls. While, once again, we do not advocate that you use The Pirate Bay to illegally download copyrighted material, using a VPN can offer you protection—no matter how you use The Pirate Bay.


Avoiding the Negative

why to use vpn for piratebayThe Pirate Bay can be an amazing resource, but it comes with a price. It can be a stressful experience. While using a VPN like NordVPN can help alleviate some of your stress, we recommend caution when using The Pirate Bay.

If you are in doubt about using The Pirate Bay or even downloading a file, the best course of action is to simply do nothing. Ultimately, it’s better to be defensive than offensive when using the platform.