Club Penguin Rewritten is shut down by authorities, three people arrested

destructoid.com:

As Destructoid’s resident Club Penguin expert and fangirl, I was devastated to hear the news that Club Penguin Rewritten, the fan-made recreation of the game that has been running on and off since 2017, has officially been shut down for good.

Rewritten had seen a huge influx of players at the start of the pandemic, making it one of the most popular Club Penguin recreation fan sites, of which there were plenty running on private servers. Per Kotaku, the website was actually seized by the City Police of London, and three people were arrested, although reports say they have since been released.

Now, all of the previously-bustling Club Penguin Rewritten sites and communities have been shut down. Its official Discord now only has one message from an admin: “CPRewritten is shutting down effective immediately due to a full request by Disney. We have voluntarily given control over the website to the police for them to continue their copyright investigation.”

The game’s website, which had over ten million users over the course of its run, is now empty aside from a statement that reads, “This site has been taken over by Operation Creative, Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU),” which is a department of the City Police of London.

it is 4am10 hours has passed since the notice that it is being shut downclub penguin rewritten has been taken by the police, no one can login nor access the site

i refuse to leave the mines. they are taking us one by one. we will sit here until the true end. pic.twitter.com/SaqvuwxtlT

— s m o l (@s_m_o_l) April 13, 2022

The police also gave a statement to a Club Penguin fansite, which stated that “Three people were arrested on April 12 on suspicion of distributing materials infringing copyright