The closure of YggTorrent has left an immediate void for a large Francophone community. This site concentrated a significant share of French-language peer-to-peer file sharing, and its disappearance is part of a series of legal actions and blockages orchestrated by ARCOM since 2024. For users who depended on this platform, the question arises bluntly: where to turn, and at what cost in terms of reliability and security.
Instability of mirrors and successors of closed torrent sites
The most common reflex after the closure of a torrent site is to look for a mirror or a successor with a similar name. This strategy has proven increasingly risky in recent years.
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The recent example of Hydracker, presented as an heir to YggTorrent, illustrates the problem well. A few weeks after its launch, the platform was hacked, potentially exposing its users’ data. This type of scenario is repeating: self-proclaimed successors are often compromised within a few weeks.
The rush of developers to fill the void left by a major site leads to neglecting security. Users connecting to these sites take risks that the former, better-established site had time to mitigate.
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Before creating an account on a recent mirror, it is better to check how long the domain has existed, read feedback on independent forums like Reddit, and never reuse a password used elsewhere. For all you need to know about the new address of GKTorrents, another Francophone site that has faced similar turbulence, caution remains the same.
Coordinated crackdown by ARCOM: what it changes for downloading in France
The disappearance of YggTorrent is not an isolated incident. Since 2024, the Paris Judicial Court has issued several blocking orders targeting domains related to piracy. ARCOM coordinates these actions and requests internet service providers to make the targeted sites inaccessible, including their variants and mirrors.
This mechanism has two direct consequences for Francophone torrent users:
- Major generalist directories that hosted content in French have become priority targets, and their online lifespan is decreasing.
- Replacement mirrors are blocked more quickly than before, sometimes within days of being reported.
- Sanctions are no longer aimed solely at site administrators but can also affect users who massively share copyrighted files.
The operational window for a generalist Francophone torrent site has significantly reduced. This observation explains why the landscape is fragmenting instead of reconstituting around a single successor.
Specialized torrents and legitimate uses: an underlying trend
The word “torrent” remains associated with piracy in the collective imagination. The BitTorrent protocol, however, remains a neutral technical tool used to efficiently distribute large files.
In recent years, legitimate uses of the torrent protocol have been notably increasing. Platforms like LinuxTracker or FOSS Torrents distribute disk images of free operating systems (Ubuntu, Fedora, Debian) and open-source software. The GitHub repository ngosang/trackerslist, maintained and continuously updated, references public trackers used for both free content and cultural archives that have entered the public domain.
This evolution does not replace the old generalist directories for those looking for movies or series in French. However, it shows that the BitTorrent protocol has a life outside of piracy, and that active communities continue to make it function within a legal framework.
What are the generalist torrent sites still online worth
Among the international platforms still accessible, some frequently come up in discussions: 1337x, The Pirate Bay, YTS, or TorrentGalaxy. Their Francophone content remains limited compared to what YggTorrent offered. Movies and series in French are rare, and French subtitles are sometimes absent.
The quality of the files also varies. On a well-moderated Francophone community site, fake files and infected content were reported and removed quickly. On a less monitored international directory, the risk of encountering a corrupted file or malware increases. Using an up-to-date torrent client, checking the number of seeders, and reading comments before downloading: these precautions are becoming more necessary than ever.
VPN and security when downloading torrent files
The question of protection comes up systematically. A VPN encrypts traffic and masks the user’s IP address from the internet service provider and third parties. For peer-to-peer downloading, a VPN reduces the risk of identification but does not make the activity legal if the downloaded content is copyrighted.
The criteria for choosing a VPN suitable for torrents differ from those of a standard VPN:
- The no-logs policy must be verifiable, ideally audited by an independent third party.
- The provider must explicitly allow P2P traffic on its servers, which is not the case for all.
- Connection speed matters: heavy encryption on a remote server can significantly reduce download speeds.
No VPN protects against a file containing malware, nor against a poorly configured torrent client that would leak the real IP address.
Copyright and individual responsibility
Downloading a torrent file is not illegal in itself. It is the content of the file that determines the legality of the act. Distributing or retrieving a protected work without permission constitutes an infringement of the intellectual property code, whether through a French or international site.
The French regulatory framework has strengthened detection and sanctioning means in recent years. Field feedback varies on the actual extent of individual prosecutions, but the legal risk exists and should not be dismissed lightly.
The closure of YggTorrent marks less the end of Francophone torrenting than a change in configuration. Major generalist directories are giving way to fragmented, less convenient solutions, and to more discreet specialized uses. For cultural content in French, legal streaming platforms remain, at this stage, the most stable and least exposed route.