The recording industry has been using more than lawsuits in the fight against illegal downloading.
One of the most effective and least-known downloading deterrents has been the scattering of "decoy" or incomplete files around peer-to-peer services -- a practice also known as "spoofing."
Record labels have reportedly been employing companies, such as New York City-based Overpeer, since 2003 to combat piracy. Their efforts have been so effective that more than 60 percent of files available on the Kazaa network are fake or damaged, helping to decrease the popularity of illegal downloading and increase user interest in legal services.
"I stopped using Kazaa because you have to download a file five or six times before you find one that works," College sophomore Ryan Khajavi said.
Companies such as these employ multiple approaches in their efforts against piracy. The most popular corrupted files are files that contain only 30-second loops of the original songs, or files that contain only a few seconds of actual music.
The anti-piracy strategy utilizes the very characteristics of peer-to-peer networks that make them so popular. Because anyone is allowed to plug into the networks, connect anonymously and share files, anti-piracy groups can easily and quickly produce and then distribute large numbers of files to hundreds of thousands of users.
Some illegal downloaders have even been greeted with files that carry messages encouraging users to download music legally.
One of the most famous incidents involving spoofed files occurred in April of 2003. Shortly before the release of Madonna's album, American Life, spoofed files flooded peer-to-peer networks, containing only the words "What the f--- do you think you're doing?"
Users soon let Madonna know, hacking into her Web site and posting links to the full version of her album, preceded by the words "This is what the f--- I think I'm doing."
Despite the large prevalence of spoofed files, file spoofing is largely unknown, thanks to by music industry officials who have played it down. However, Overpeer's Web site claims its servers receive 25 billion download hits per month.
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