HYBE Files Suit to Stop Bootleg BTS Merch Sales Outside U.S. Tour Stops

HYBE has taken legal action to shut down the sale of counterfeit BTS merchandise outside U.S. venues on the group's ARIRANG world tour, seeking a broad court order that would allow the company to confiscate knockoff goods before, during, and after upcoming shows.

The lawsuit, filed Friday in New Jersey federal court, seeks a nationwide injunction allowing HYBE to seize bootleg merchandise sold near stadiums where BTS performs. That kind of legal maneuver has become routine for major tours in recent years, giving artists and their representatives a fast, standing mechanism to go after unlicensed vendors rather than pursuing individual cases after the fact.

According to the complaint, unauthorized sellers have already set up shop around stadium grounds during ARIRANG tour stops in Tampa, El Paso, Stanford and Las Vegas since the tour launched in April.

HYBE is looking to get ahead of the problem before BTS kicks off its next American leg on August 1 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, with further dates planned in Foxborough, Baltimore, Arlington, Chicago and Los Angeles.

HYBE's attorneys argue in the filing that counterfeiters have already sold unauthorized and infringing merchandise during the tour's current run and will keep doing so around the New Jersey shows and beyond without a court stepping in. The company describes the bootleg goods such as t-shirts, posters and similar items, as designed to closely resemble official BTS merchandise, but sold at lower prices and made with inferior materials.

That resemblance, HYBE argues, is exactly the problem. The company says the counterfeit operations undercut what it calls its carefully managed merchandising strategy, which spans online sales, pop-up retail locations and in-venue sales run in partnership with Amazon Music. By selling cheaper look-alike products nearby, bootleggers siphon off potential revenue that would otherwise go through those official channels.

If the court grants the injunction, HYBE would gain the authority to seize, hold, and ultimately destroy counterfeit merchandise at every remaining U.S. stop on the tour, giving the company a tool to act quickly at each new venue rather than filing separate legal action city by city.

This type of pre-emptive injunction has become a familiar strategy across the touring industry, used in recent years by official merchandising partners for acts including Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, The Weeknd, the Jonas Brothers, Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, Kendrick Lamar, SZA and Olivia Rodrigo. In most of those cases, it's the licensed merchandise companies that bring the lawsuits.

HYBE's situation stands a bit apart, since the company owns the BTS name and its associated imagery outright rather than licensing them from a separate label. This isn't new territory for HYBE either; it previously won similar injunctions targeting bootleg sellers during BTS tour stops in the U.S. back in 2019 and 2021.

The legal fight comes amid a major moment for the group. The ARIRANG tour follows BTS's return from an extended hiatus and arrives on the heels of the chart-topping comeback album of the same name, released in March. The tour launched April 9 in Goyang, South Korea, and is scheduled to continue through 2027 with stops across Asia, North America, Europe, South America and Australia.

Commercially, the tour has already made a significant mark. It topped Billboard's Boxscore chart in both April and May, pulling in a combined $204 million across those two months. That May total set a new record for the biggest monthly gross by a group since Boxscore began tracking data in 2019, surpassing a previous mark held by The Rolling Stones.