Nintendo Sues Developers of Yuzu Emulator, Seeking to End Piracy and Control Domain

Nintendo Sues Developers of Yuzu Emulator in Federal Court, Aiming to Shut It Down

Nintendo has filed a lawsuit in US federal court once morest the developers of the Yuzu emulator, a popular software used to play Nintendo games on the Steam Deck. The company alleges that Yuzu violates the anti-circumvention and anti-trafficking provisions of the Digital Millennium Act (DMCA), as well as accuses the creators of copyright infringement. Nintendo claims that Yuzu is designed to circumvent the encryption on Nintendo Switch games, enabling users to play copyrighted games without permission.

In its lawsuit, Nintendo seeks a permanent injunction to stop Yuzu’s operation, as well as the transfer of its domain names, URLs, chatrooms, and social media accounts to Nintendo’s control. It also demands the seizure and destruction of Yuzu’s hard drives and seeks monetary damages.

The legality of emulators has long been a topic of debate. While there is legal precedence for reverse engineering consoles and developing emulators that do not use the company’s source code, modern emulators that require encryption bypasses and copyrighted BIOSes complicate the matter. The Dolphin Emulator, for instance, faced legal issues when it included Nintendo’s Wii common key to bypass copyright protection on Wii games.

Yuzu takes a different approach by requiring users to provide their own BIOSes and keys obtained through various means, including downloading pirated copies. Nintendo argues that Yuzu knowingly facilitates piracy on a large scale by providing instructions on how to use unlawful copies of Nintendo Switch games, testing the compatibility of thousands of games, and linking to websites that help users obtain and distribute prod.keys.

Nintendo’s complaint suggests that Yuzu’s primary purpose is to provide access to official Nintendo Switch games without authorization. If Nintendo can prove this claim, Yuzu may be in violation of DMCA Section 1201(a)(2), which prohibits products primarily designed to circumvent technological measures controlling access to copyrighted works.

Richard Hoeg, a business attorney and host of the Virtual Legality podcast, explains that while emulators can be legal when correctly engineered,