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UMG, WMG And Sony Sue Megaupload.com Over Illegal Filesharing
April 11, 2014 at 3:58 AM (PT)
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The three major record labels have filed a civil lawsuit against the file-sharing site, MEGAUPLOAD.COM, and its operators for copyright infringement.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL reports, "the suit, filed in the U.S. District Court in VIRGINIA, comes three days after studios represented by the MOTION PICTURE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA filed their own complaint there, saying that the studios are entitled to profits earned by Megaupload and its executives, plus $150,000 per copyright infringement. Among the defendants named in the suit are MEGAUPLOAD LTD. and three executives of the company: MATHIAS ORTMANN, BRAM VAN DER KOLK and founder KIM DOTCOM.
UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP, WARNER MUSIC GROUP and SONY MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT claim MEGAUPLOAD generated more than $175 million in profits between 2005 and 2012 from the illegal downloads. The JOURNAL notes the, "complaint lists 87 out of thousands of copyrighted works allegedly distributed without permission by MEGUPLOAD, including KATY PERRY's 'California Gurls,' JOURNEY's 'Don't Stop Believin'' and LADY GAGA's 'Poker Face'."

