@Nekoya-Sensei I don't have enough knowledge about this topic, so keep this mind:
Pretty much anything that has a copyright is intelectual property.
Scanlating and keeping it to yourself is not illegal per se, but scanlating and sharing without permition (this is exclusive to most scanlations, scans approved by the author like twitter series don't count) is where the crime begins, because you are doing it "for free" and the original creator is not receiving compensation, that is why we always ask people to support the author and publishers by buying from official sources that will earn them money, of course, not everyone will do this, there's people like me who don't have the money, others don't even have access to things like manga and anime and are forced to pirate to enjoy it. As long as scanlation in MD stays free, we are only pirating and not stealing the profits from the publishers and authors, but we are still "in the wrong".
Anyway, i will leave this topic at that, because i don't know enough to make arguments