With various file sharing services recently closing their doors after Megaupload was seized and shut down by the U.S. Government it was only a matter of time before the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) jumped into the fray and demanded the closure of other sites. First on the organizations list is Hotfile, a file-sharing website that the organization calls a virtual copycat of Megaupload.
The MPAA is seeking a summary judgement, claiming that the same business model is used by Hotfile when compared to Megaupload.
Among the studios involved in the claim are Warner Brothers, Disney, 20th Century Fox, Universal and Columbia. Those company’s claim that because the company does not work to identify copyright materials it does not qualify for “Safe Harbor” status as outlined under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
In the meantime owner Anton Titov said his company’s “report abuse” form is enforced while a tool offered to “selected copyright owners” allows them to “instantaneously take down files they believe infringe on their copyrights.”
Titov further complains that Hotfile provides nothing technically challenging to get in the way of filing copyright infringement claims.
Hotfile is no stranger to MPAA lawsuits, last year they were sued but then countersued, claiming that Warner Brothers violated DMCA rules by constantly requesting that the site take down content Warner Bros. did not own.
Do you think Hotfile has violated DMCA rules based on the various illegally hosted files on the company’s servers or should it be allowed to continue its operations?
