Korea rules against song-sharing

South Korea's Soribada is fined for copyright violation

SEOUL, South Korea -- A South Korean court has ordered the operator of a defunct file-sharing Web site to pay $75,300 ($98 million won) to two local record labels for violating copyrights.

The ruling by a Seoul District Civil Court judge is the first against a free song-sharing Web service in South Korea, where nearly half the population of 46 million are Internet users.

World Music Entertainment and Most Best Music had sued Seoul-based Internet Empire in November for three times that amount for operating a Web site that allowed users to share songs and music videos.

"We have set a precedent for other battles against song-sharing services," said Kim Dae-young, a spokesman for World Music Entertainment.

Two weeks ago, prosecutors indicted creators of South Korea's largest free song-sharing service, Soribada, on charges of copyright violation.

Soribada has denied any wrongdoing, saying their service only provides private channels of communication and does not control or monitor users' activities.

The Recording Industry Association of Korea, a lobby of 133 music labels, had sought the indictment since January. It claims recording firms lost $154 million in album sales last year because of Soribada.

"The ruling (against Internet Empire) will encourage more music labels to actively fight song-sharing services. It couldn't be better news for us," said Park Ki-young, an association spokesman.

Internet Empire said it has not yet decided whether to appeal.

"We had operated the site to help spread the Internet in South Korea. It's regretful that we are depicted as criminals," spokesman Yoo Jung-mok said.

Internet Empire had closed its site, Vqfzone, in October. It was fined $769 in January for loading songs and music videos for a year without the consent of copyright holders.

South Korean record labels' fight against the dozen song-sharing Web services in the country gained momentum in March when a U.S. federal court ordered Napster, a song-swap service based in Redwood City, California, to block users from sharing pirated songs.

Since 1999, global music labels like BGM, EMI and Warner have been battling to shut down Napster, which once helped tens of millions of users share music files free.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.