Wrestling Industry Joins Copyright Trolls

The daughter company of World Wrestling Entertainment, WWE Studios Finance, has recently filed "copyright trolling" lawsuits against alleged downloaders of the movie "Eliminators" featuring WWE superstar Wade Barrett, in the attempt to uncover the identities of dozens of BitTorrent pirates and extract some money from them.



World Wrestling Entertainment is pursuing anonymous BitTorrent users, as became known a few days ago from a series of complaints filed at federal courts in three US states. The cases are filed by daughter company WWE Studios Finance, which has produced several movies in recent years – including the subject of the lawsuits, “Eliminators” title featuring Wade Barrett. The number of defendants varies per lawsuit, ranging from 8 to several dozens.

WWE claims that the copyright infringements resulted in a loss of income for the moviemakers, while ultimately hurting local theaters, venues, and the greater state economy. The company’s complaints only list IP-addresses, without certain names of BitTorrent file-sharers, and WWE admits that there can be a situation that the account holder itself may not be the infringer. After an additional investigation (if necessary), the alleged infringers will face actual or statutory damages of up to $150,000 (per each case of infringement under the law). That is unless they settle out of court, which is what usually happens in “trolling” cases.

On the other hand, things might not go that far, because some courts don’t agree to join several file-sharing defendants in one lawsuit. In this case, as well, the Connecticut Court ordered the WWE Studios Finance to explain why their case shouldn’t be dismissed for lack of proper joinder.

Thanks to TorrentFreak for providing the source of the article.