Study: Sweden has 700,000 file sharers

A recent study from independent Statistics Sweden shows that nearly 700,000 Swedes regularly used peer-to-peer file sharing programmes at the beginning of 2008. No less then 38 percent of  Swedens young men are engaging in such often illegal Internet activities. "More than a third of all men aged 16 to 24 used a peer-to-peer file sharing programme during the first quarter of 2008", Statistics Sweden said in a report on Internet use.

Sweden, which has about nine million people, counted over 685,100 peer-to-peer file sharers during the first three months of the year, according to the study, which was based on a poll of 3,837 people between April 7 and June 9.

The Swedish government has proposed a new law based on the European Union\'s Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (IPRED), that would make it easier to track people who illegally share copyrighted material on the Internet.

The law, which is expected to go into effect on April 1 will oblige Internet service providers to hand over the IP addresses of computers used for illegal downloads, allowing copyright holders to sue illegal file sharers.