The hosting service Rapidshare was sentenced by the German Justice to pay a fine of 24 million euros (U.S. $ 66 million), due to permit the storage of music protected by copyright. The Regional Court of Hamburg ruled that the site must also filter the content more effectively.
The lawsuit was brought by Gema, Germany’s national collection and distribution rights of music, which demanded the withdrawal of 5,000 songs available online.

“The decision indicates that the hosting service is now responsible for checking that none of the songs are distributed so illegal in the future,” said the organization. “This means that the copyright owner doesn’t need perform this check complex any more.”

The trial represents another initiative of the authorities to protect copyright, which has led to the conviction of the Swedish site The Pirate Bay.

Another site that is experiencing the same problems is Mininova which is responds a lawsuit in Netherlands. Far from having the same attention that the Pirate Bay trial received, Mininova was at the court in last Tuesday in the Netherlands. The verdict, however, will only be announced on July 15.

Mininova’s lawyers argued that the site is already taking steps to ensure that copyrights are protected, removing the material from copyright protected when there is complaint from the copyright owner.

Via: The Register.