A prominent Nintendo Switch piracy website has reportedly been taken down by the FBI and FIOD.
Over the last couple of years, Nintendo seems to have really gone hard on its anti-piracy measures, presumably in reaction to The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom leaks getting out early. Early in 2024, the biggest Switch emulator Yuzu was taken down alongside a $2.4 million settlement paid to Nintendo, with the other popular Switch emulator Ryujinx apparently being offered an agreement to take down the program.
In the time since, Nintendo has been looking at Switch piracy subreddits and has filed a suit against a streamer for streaming unreleased games. Some players are also reporting that their Switch 2 consoles have been bricked when using Mig Flash cards, even if they have legally dumped their own roms onto them.
However, Nintendo isn't the only entity taking Switch piracy seriously, as now reports have emerged that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Dutch Fiscal Information and Investigation Service (FIOD) have taken down a prominent Nintendo Switch ROM site. Spotted by Kotaku, a message on Nsw2u (seen in Kotaku's report, and verified using the Wayback Machine) claims that the site's domain "has been seized" by the FBI "in accordance with a seizure warrant issued pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 2323 issued by the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia."
The webpage also said that the seizure was "part of a law enforcement operation and action" by the FBI and FIOD, meaning that the operation was between agencies in both the US and the Netherlands. This message is no longer loading, however, with the website now seemingly impossible to access.
The report notes that Nsw2u was placed on an EU piracy watchlist back in May, which may explain why the Dutch FIOD was apparently involved in the takedown alongside the FBI.
It's worth noting that there's no indication that Nintendo itself was involved in the takedown of the site. However, we've reached out to the company for comment on the situation, and will update this story if we receive a response.
