The US District Court for the Southern District of Florida has ordered file-sharing site Hotfile to pay $80m in damages to settle a piracy case with the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).
The site has also been told it must shutdown all its operations unless it starts using copyright filtering technologies that avoid breaching the studios’ works.
MPAA chairman and CEO Senator Chris Dodd said:"Sites like Hotfile that illegally profit off of the creativity and hard work of others do a serious disservice to audiences, who deserve high-quality, legitimate viewing experiences online," Dodd said.
The judgement marks the end of the studios’ proceedings against Hotfile and its chief, Anton Titov.
In August 2013, the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida ruled that Hotfile was responsible for copyright infringement, and Titov was personally accountable for infringement.
Five US movie studios sued Hotfile in 2011, alleging that it paid incentives to consumers for uploading well-liked files to the system, which were then extensively shared.
