CNET and CBS Sued for Promoting Piracy

Alki David, the founder of FilmOn and the Justice for Artist Coalition are going after CNET and CBS Interactive in a court of law, claiming that the two are profiting and promoting copyright infringement acts by offering P2P and digital-rights-management-cracking software.

According to TorrentFreak, this is not the first time when CNET and CBS are called before a judge by David and his posy, since earlier this year they filled a similar lawsuit which was dropped back in July.

The representatives of the artists claim that the accused companies are popularizing and distributing peer-to-peer software used to commit piracy acts.

“..one particular group of businesses – led by Defendants CBS Interactive and CNET – have knowingly and willingly participated in and profited mightily from the same massive infringement that engendered large copyright suits against Napster and LimeWire and that ultimately crippled them financially,” reads the court document.

Download.com is considered by the plaintiffs as being the main tool used by CBS and CNET in their so-called piracy promoting processes.

“CBS Interactive has quietly made billions by inducing the public to break the law, by providing them the file-sharing software and step-by-step guides, on exactly how to do it. No one has held Defendant accountable for this. Until now.”

The artists want CBS and CNET to pay compensations and stop promoting and providing P2P software since they consider them to be guilty of inducing copyright infringement, contributory copyright infringement and vicarious copyright infringement.

Others might join the battle soon since a lot of groups may consider themselves and their incomes affected by these practices.

“We have only scratched the surface. Many more rights-holders are coming forward representing tens of thousands of more intellectual properties but the verification process for identifying ownership is long and detailed, so we will keep on adding as we go,” David told TorrentFreak.