British Police Arrest Six Users of OiNK Music-sharing Service

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on June 2, 2008 - 10:10am.

London - Police in Britain have recently arrested six users of the OiNK BitTorrent-based file-sharing service, who are believed to have engaged in sharing pre-release albums, TorrentFreak reported. The individuals -- five men ages 19 to 33 and one 28-year-old woman -- were arrested on suspicion of "conspiracy to defraud the music industry," sources told TorrentFreak.

Those arrested were questioned, required to provide DNA samples and fingerprints, and released on bail.

TorrentFreak says it confirmed that at least two of the arrests are for the alleged uploading of a single album.

The OiNK site was shut down in October, following actions taken by authorities in the U.K. and the Netherlands, where the site's servers were hosted.

OiNK had a reported 180,000 members, and had offered at least 60 pre-release albums in 2007 before being shut down after complaints from the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) and International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI).

"The illegal online distribution of music, particularly pre-release, is hugely damaging, and as OiNK was the biggest source for pre-releases at the time we moved to shut it down," reads a joint statement from BPI and IFPI.

"We provided the information to assist this investigation, but this is now a police matter and we are unable to comment further at this stage."