Finnish Supreme Court: BitTorrent admins assist in copyright infringement

After sever years of litigation, the Finnish High Court has now sentenced seven Finnish BitTorrent admins for fines amounting to a total of 680,000 euros for their assisting role in the illegal distribution of copyrighted material on Finreactor.

On behalf of parties including Microsoft and Adobe, Finnish police seized the computers of several admins of the popular Finnish BitTorrent site Finreactor in 2004. Some of the admins even spent the night in jail.

Eventually 24 users were engaged in a criminal procedure on the ground of criminal copyright infringement. All but on were convicted and sentenced to pay thousands of dollars in fines and penalties. In addition, 32 admins and moderators were engaged in a civil procedure. Of these, 21 were eventually convicted for claims ranging from assisting in copyright infringement to direct copyright infringement.

Several of the admins appealed the sentence to the Court of Appeal and even the High Court in order to prove their innocence. Last June 30th the Finnish Supreme Court however found that seven of Finreactor’s admins played an essential role in assisting users of the BitTorrent infringing on copyright protected works. A total compensation of 680,000 euro was set by the High Court; an amount considerably higher than the 420,000 euros determined by the Court of Appeal earlier.

Bron: Torrentfreak en Helsinki Times