Club Penguin Rewritten, a popular remake, launched February 12, 2017, had reached a million players as of October 12, 2017, though discontinued "permanently" on March 4, 2018. Citing community support and funding, however, it returned with all accounts intact on April 27, 2018. Club Penguin Rewritten had reached eight million registered accounts on December 2, 2020; nearly twice as many as Club Penguin had 14 years earlier in December 2006. During the COVID-19 pandemic, private servers experienced a surge in popularity, with between 6,000 and 8,000 new players signing up each day. On April 16, 2020, American musician Soccer Mommy collaborated with Club Penguin Rewritten to host a virtual concert for her new album Color Theory. The event had been rescheduled from April 2, 2020, due to higher than expected player counts that overloaded the server. As of May 21, 2020, the collective number of player accounts registered on all private servers numbered over 15 million. Legal status Since private servers essentially copy materials copyrighted by Disney, there has been much controversy as to whether or not creating and hosting them is legal. Disney and Club Penguin have pursued numerous CPPSes and attempted to have them taken down with DMCA notices. Vulnerabilities Many private servers have become vulnerable to DDOS attacks and database leaks due to insufficient security measures. On January 21, 2018, the login data of over 1.7 million Club Penguin Rewritten users were stolen after a data breach and on July 27, 2019, the private server again suffered a data breach with over 4 million accounts stolen in addition to the previous breach. Shutdown On May 14, 2020, it was announced that all private servers using the Club Penguin brand were given DMCA take-down notices after allegations emerged concerning child predation by an administrator of another popular private server, Club Penguin Online. According to an investigation by the BBC, one man involved with the site had been arrested on suspicion of possessing child pornography. Detectives say the man from London has been released on bail pending further inquiries. On May 15, 2020, the site was shut down after complying with the DMCA takedown notice by The Walt Disney Company. In a statement, Disney said, "Child safety is a top priority for the Walt Disney Company and we are appalled by the allegations of criminal activity and abhorrent behaviour on this unauthorised website that is illegally using the Club