Demonoid is a BitTorrent tracker and website founded in 2003 to facilitate file-sharing–related discussion and provide a searchable index of torrent files.
From the mid-2000s, Demonoid grew as one of the largest trackers in the world along with The Pirate Bay,[8][9] which led to an increase in legal threats from copyright owners.
[10][11] On April 10, 2008, Deimos stepped down as the administrator of Demonoid, citing a number of reasons and "distraction with real-world issues".
He also stated that he has "handed the reins over to a new administrator" – "a close friend of [his]", whom he trusts completely and has the knowledge and time to take care of the site.
"[12] The official explanation read as follows: A few months ago, the site administrator (known as Deimos), lacked the time necessary to maintain this website.
[15] After a decrease in the audience during the 2010s, he was reportedly working in early 2018 to rebuild the website to the thriving community of the previous decade.
The explanation as widely speculated[21] was that they had received a letter from a lawyer for the Canadian Recording Industry Association threatening legal action.
[20][23] Visitors from Canadian-based IPs would be redirected to the downtime version of the website, which contained an explanation of the legal threats.
Additionally, while the website may have been blocked in Canada at the time, the tracker was still readily accepting Canadian IP addresses.
[citation needed] The threats are in spite of the open question of the legality of music file sharing in Canada.
[25] On November 9, 2007, the site again went offline, reportedly due to legal threats to their service provider from the Canadian Recording Industry Association.
A placeholder page stated, "The CRIA threatened the company renting the servers to us, and because of this it is not possible to keep the site online.
[22] Six days later, the placeholder page was updated with a link to a new forum, unrelated to file sharing, for the community.
On September 14, 2009, Demonoid's torrent tracker went down after it was reported that they had experienced a number of hardware problems stemming from power outages.
A message was posted on the homepage stating that "We might have to shut down everything to fix and prevent further damage," and that it could be "days maybe, until we can change the power circuit.
"[28] During the downtime that followed, several new messages appeared, mostly providing updates on the repair status and promising that the site would return soon.
An anonymous ColoCall source reported that the Ukrainian police had raided the hosting provider and seized Demonoid's data.
[citation needed] On November 12, 2012, demonoid.me began resolving to an IP address based in Hong Kong, where a tracker was operating.
[35] In November 2013, demonoid.me and demonoid.ph started redirecting to demonoid.com, whose website began displaying a page that hints at a possible comeback of the site, with the message "We will rebuild!
[citation needed] On May 7, 2013, d2, an unofficial website based on Demonoid's databases went live at d2.vu, with hosting provided by the U.S.-based service RamNode.
[citation needed] On February 17, 2019, an official statement was made stating that ownership of demonoid.pw was lost and to avoid visiting it.