Officials have arrested the administrator of a website that streamed 3,000 pirated movies online and earned about 5 million baht a month from advertisements.

The Department of Special Investigation director-general said on Thursday that investigators found that website movie2free.com, which streamed pirated movies, was run by a Thai man living abroad. The website operator, aged around 30, had hired a 22-year-old man living in the North as administrator.

The administrator was arrested at his house early this month and the website was shut down.

The site had used sophisticated equipment that made it hard for authorities to track it down, and had set up a server abroad.

Movie2free.com earned about 5 million baht a month from online gambling advertisements, the DSI chief said.

The action followed a request by the Motion Picture Association in the US and Hollywood copyright agents, who asked the DSI to investigate the website, saying it streamed more than 3,000 pirated films.

Investigators found out the website, which opened in 2014, drew about 10 million views a day. It was Thailand’s most-visited pirated movie website and also was on the global top-list of pirated movie sites.