Finnish P2P hub operator gets suspended sentence, large fine

[p2p rules]

A 33 year old man has been handed a suspended sentence for operating a P2P hub using DirectConnect  in Finland. The man received a four month suspended sentence after he was found to be the operator of a DirectConnect hub where he was also sharing a considerable amount of music.

His computers and equipment were originally seized in June 2007 and were found to contain a significant amount of "infringing music" files. He later restarted the hub with new computers, which were seized yet again in October 2007. Records showed that up to 2,000 people were using his hub to share about 80 terabytes of content.

The 33 year old must now pay €307,450 in compensation to rights' holders in addition to the four months suspended sentence. The decision was made yesterday by a Finnish District Court.

"Imprisonment is the right penalty for this type of deliberate, planned and very harmful conduct in which the administrator facilitates widespread unauthorised file-sharing," said Antti Kotilainen of CIAPC.

AfterDawn