Milan - Italian police and FPM, the local music industry anti-piracy organization, have conducted raids and will charge eleven individuals with copyright infringement for their involvement with a Direct Connect-based file-sharing network in Italy, called "Discotequezone."

The Italian Fiscal Police had been monitoring the network for months, seizing several servers in March, and recently conducted raids in Rome, Milan and Brescia that netted 11 computers and more than 110,000 allegedly illegal MP3 files.

The network's administrators, along with seven people who allegedly uploaded large volumes of copyrighted music to the network, now face prosecution that could bring fines of up to $12 million in each case, according to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI).

Related Links:
http://www.ifpi.org/content/section_news/20071001.html

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071001/tc_nm/media_piracy_italy_dc_1

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_Connect_%28file_sharing%29