Aimster Injunction In Place

A U.S. District Court judge has ordered file-swapping site Aimster to begin using filtering technologies to block the trading of unauthorized copyrighted works on its network. The ruling is the result of a request for a preliminary injunction filed by the RIAA, which is suing Aimster--now known as Madster--for copyright infringement.

U.S. District Court Judge Marvin Aspen of the Northern District of Illinois first ruled in favor of a preliminary injunction Sept. 4 (Bulletin, Sept. 5). After issuing that opinion, he asked for proposals from the parties for the language of the injunction. The court has adopted the record companies' and music publishers' proposed injunction in full after Aimster failed to submit its own language. Aimster argued that it is impossible to filter out infringing recordings.

Under terms of the injunction, Aimster must immediately prevent its users from uploading and downloading copyrighted works, or it must shut down its operations until it can do so. The company also must employ technological measures to prevent copyright infringement and keep the court updated on its efforts to prevent infringement.

RIAA president Cary Sherman calls the ruling "another clear-cut legal victory for copyright owners and everyone who wants to see the legitimate online market grow." Sherman warned other operators of peer-to-peer networks that they too should employ filtering technologies to block illegal file-swapping.

Aimster execs were not available for comment.