Federal jury says music downloader owes $1.92 Mln
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) could soon be $1.92 million richer after a federal jury Thursday ruled a Minnesota mother of four who downloaded 24 songs violated music copyrights.
The RIAA recently changed its tactics against what it maintains is the illegal downloading of music from the Internet. It is now asking Internet service providers to send warnings to suspected illegal downloaders.
The massive verdict in the nation's only filing-sharing case to go to trial, found Jammie Thomas-Rasset, 32, committed willful violation of the copyrights.
Rasset is being charged $80,000 for each of the 24 songs she downloaded from the Kazaa file-sharing network. Among the downloaded songs were tunes by popular acts like Gloria Estefan, Sheryl Crow and Green Day.
Under the Copyright Act, juries can award up to $150,000 per illegally downloaded track, though roughly $3,500 was the average payment in the majority of RIAA cases that were settled out of court.
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