Over 200,000 John Does Sued for File Sharing in the U.S. Since the Start of 2010

Does sued, Jan 2010-present.

Copyright owners have greatly increased the number of lawsuits for filesharing in the U.S., and have sued 201,828 John Does since the beginning of 2010.  TorrentFreak has published data on the cases, and describes them as part of a “pay-up-or-else scheme” which could lead to millions paid in out of court settlements: “Through these mass lawsuits the copyright holders are trying to obtain the personal details of (mostly) BitTorrent users who allegedly shared their material online. Once this information is handed over, they then offer the defendant the opportunity to settle the case for a few hundred up to a couple of thousand dollars, thereby avoiding a full trial and potentially even bigger financial penalties.”

SOURCE: TorrentFreak. “200,000 BitTorrent Users Sued In The United States.” August 7, 2011.