Piracy of Anime, Japanese Games, and Related Merchandise Inflicts $68 Billion in Damages on Rights Holders
Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) announced the results of its research on the issue of online piracy of Japanese content on January 26th. According to the findings, damages from piracy in 2025 grew to 5.7 trillion yen (approximately $36.9 billion USD), nearly triple the 2 trillion yen ($12.9 billion USD) recorded in the previous 2022 survey.
However, as reported by ITMedia News, new categories such as "character merchandise" were included in the research starting in 2025. When these are also taken into account, the total damages for that year amount to 10.4 trillion yen (about $67.4 billion USD).
The study involved consumers from Japan, China, Vietnam, France, the United States, and Brazil. Based on their responses, an approximate value of the damage caused by the online piracy of Japanese content was calculated. The collected data was analyzed across five main categories: film (including anime and video content), publishing (books, manga, etc.), music, video games, and character merchandise.
In all categories, the amount of damage has nearly tripled over the past three years. The most significant were publishing (2.6 trillion yen) and film (2.3 trillion yen) (excluding the aforementioned damages from character merchandise piracy). These were followed by video games (500 billion yen) and music piracy (100 billion yen).
Although the Japanese government states that the per capita volume of pirated content consumed has decreased compared to previous years, the total amount of damage appears to have increased. This is attributed to factors such as price and exchange rate fluctuations, the overall growth in the number of internet users consuming pirated content, and the growing popularity of Japanese content overseas.
Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) pledges to continue its efforts to reduce the damage caused by online content piracy. Among the measures they are working to implement are: creating new platforms for cooperation with local authorities, strengthening judicial systems, enhancing measures against copyright infringement using generative AI and counterfeit products, and establishing property rights databases that could expedite legal proceedings.
However, the government also notes that as long as there is demand for Japanese content, pirated versions will appear regardless of how strong anti-piracy measures are. Therefore, its main goal will be to "guide consumers of pirated content towards legal means of access." Thus, it promises to continue supporting the expansion of global streaming and distribution platforms that handle Japanese content.