The move is part of a concerted action that will be taken in 17 countries around the world Tuesday against offenders who illegally upload music files onto the Internet, said the Hong Kong branch of London-based International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI).
Other countries, including Sweden, Switzerland, Argentina and Singapore are also taking legal action to curb online piracy on Tuesday. IFPI Hong Kong said it has located 22 individuals in the city who have allegedly used peer-to-peer illegal file sharing technology to upload music files onto local websites and has started legal proceedings against them.
"This is a very important day for the music industry here. We’ve decided to take legal action against these copyright infringers," Hung Tik, chairman of IFPI Hong Kong, told reporters.
"We have used different ways in the past with advertisements and education, hoping these internet users would respect copyright but we found this has had very little success.
"We are now forced to take legal action against them," he said. IFPI Hong Kong chief executive Ricky Fung said the group is seeking compensation of about 3,500 US dollars from each of the 22 who were found to have uploaded at least 100 songs onto the internet for sharing.
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