Nintendo Switch piracy sites with over three million downloads wiped out by FBI

While most people fork up hard-earned dollars for the latest Nintendo Switch games, others resort to nefarious means to get a piece of Mario action. There are thousands of sites out there, many of them offering up rips of popular titles, or blasts from the past. Wiping out a wave of Nintendo Switch 2 pirates, the FBI confirms its success in closing down multiple sites, although significant damage has already been done.

Piracy and Nintendo consoles have a long and complicated history together. Whether it’s using the R4 cartridge to boot up the best Nintendo DS games, or Switch 2 MIG cartridges to store new Switch games, tech-savvy enthusiasts always find a way around Nintendo’s best efforts to stop them. In a recent FBI statement, it notes that “between February 28, 2025, and May 28, 2025, records indicate a total of 3.2 million downloads occurred on these sites from the most used download service. These actions resulting in an estimated loss of $170 million.”

Although the investigation is ongoing, the FBI is making moves to put a sizeable dent in the viability of Nintendo Switch piracy going forward. “The FBI has obtained authorization to seize the domain of multiple sites, to include nsw2u.com, nswdl.com, game-2u.com, bigngame.com, ps4pkg.com, ps4pkg.net, and mgnetu.com,” it states. If you attempt to access any of these sites, you’re greeted with an FBI warning, declaring that the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia has seized the site.

Nintendo’s fight back against rogue downloads of its games faces more obstacles than before in the age of portable gaming consoles such as the Steam Deck, Lenovo Legion Go, or Asus ROG Ally. Although many players are downloading Nintendo Switch ROMs to play on the company’s proprietary hardware, some are relying on emulation software to circumvent the need to buy or upgrade to the Nintendo Switch 2.

Last year, Nintendo assumed control of Ryujinx, a popular Switch emulation application that became a staple for Steam Deck users. However, arguably the highest profile case related to Switch piracy boils down to the incarceration of Gary Bowser. Sentenced to 40 months of imprisonment in 2021, the former Team Xecuter hacker was initially part of a group that sold chips allowing players to play illegally acquired games.

Bowser’s role in the scheme was smaller than that of his compatriots, Max Louarn and Yuanning Chen, but the latter duo never faced legal action. The former couldn’t be extradited to the United States, while Chen didn’t find themselves under arrest. In an interview with Nick Moses in 2023, Bowser claims he’s only paid off $175 of the $14.5 million he owes to Nintendo in restitution.

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