Music industry demands Pirate Bay acquisition fee

Music industry bosses are demanding that Global Gaming Factory (GGF), the Swedish firm set to acquire controversial file sharing site The Pirate Bay, must hand over any acquisition fee to them, according to reports.

Pirate Bay founders Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij and Gottfrid Svartholm Warg were fined US$3.6m in the Swedish courts in April after losing an earlier lawsuit brought by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), and were sentenced to a year in prison, despite protesting that they no longer own the site.

Jo Oliver, general counsel for the IFPI, has now written a strongly worded letter to GGF chief executive Hans Pandeya, stating that the organisation will ask the Swedish authorities to "issue an order prohibiting GGF from paying the purchase sum to the founders of The Pirate Bay".

"We need to warn you that, if GGF takes responsibility for The Pirate Bay service in its current form, or if GGF operates The Pirate Bay in any way in violation of applicable copyright law, we will be forced to take legal action," the letter continued.

GGF announced plans to acquire the troubled site in June in a £4.72m deal with the idea of turning it into a legal site which would offer content in return for users' computing resources.

The deal is expected to be completed by the end of the month.