Spotting Pirated Content

[strubdog]

2 years ago I bought Shout Factory release of "Homicide: Life On The Street" (Complete Series) on DVD. Every disc that I use to rip via MakeMKV. I get a message that the disc was made using DVDFAB MacTheRipper. Is this a sign that the copy I bought was actually pirated/counterfeit or is this likely Shout Factory being lazy when they pressed the discs?

Just mildly curious.

[segfaulted]

Check the color of the disc's bottom side. If it's some shade of purple, it's probably a counterfeit. (Do note however, there are legit examples like manufacturered-on-demand movies that are shipped on DVD-R)

What does MakeMKV say for the disc protection? Typical DVD releases should have CSS. Counterfeit discs never do.

This next one isnt 100% conclusive, but: how many gigabytes of data is on the disc? If it's around 4GB, that sounds fishy in my opinion. 6-7GB on a disc is usually where legit DVDs would be.

[strubdog]

I'm pretty sure it's a bootleg The amazing thing is that I bought this on Amazon.

[MartyMcNuts]

I'm pretty sure it's a bootleg The amazing thing is that I bought this on Amazon.

Nothing amazing there! There's tons of bootleg discs on Amazon.

[Billycar11]

I'm pretty sure it's a bootleg The amazing thing is that I bought this on Amazon.

It all about the seller not the store front
Amazon random seller who knows
Shipped and sold by Amazon likely not a fake.

[strubdog]

I know what to look for now. I also know how to tell when I open the disc in MakeMKV.

[olePigeon]

You can add Red Dwarf and Are You Being Served? DVD box sets from Amazon as confirmed bootlegs.

The bootleg copies are sold in large multi-disc containers instead of individually packaged DVDs in a box set. Amazon advertises them as "repackaged." I thought perhaps the discs were taken from box sets that were returned damaged, then repackaged and sold at a discount.

No. They're just straight up fake, sold by Amazon. They've since stopped selling it. This is what it looks like so you know not to buy it:

https://www.amazon.com/Are-You-Being-Se ... 79079408X/

Here is an example of the Red Dwarf bootleg, still being sold by a 3rd party:

https://www.amazon.com/RED-DWARF-COMPLE ... 00DVKSVJ8/

Exact same packaging.

Found out too late when running MakeMKV to back them up to my network storage, so way past the return date. Very frustrating.

[olePigeon]

This is also bootleg:

https://www.amazon.com/Taxi-Complete-Ju ... 08N5GJPMB/

I let Amazon know. They pulled the other two, but are still selling this one. Don't buy it.

[BrettTheRipper]

According to Keepa, Amazon hasn't been selling those first two titles (Red Dwarf and Are You Being Served Again?), at least not for years, so I suspect you got them from third-party sellers. I've bought hundreds of DVDs and Blu-Rays from Amazon over the years, both movies and television shows, and the only bootlegs I found when I ripped my disk collection came from eBay sellers offering surprisingly low prices.