How Movies Enter the Internet
Warner Bros. film studio has sued several people, including a Hollywood actor, who it alleges made illegal digital copies of movies and distributed them on the Internet, court papers show.
A lawsuit filed by Time Warner unit Warner Bros. on Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, claims actor Carmine Caridi received "screener" copies of films The Last Samurai and Mystic River and gave them to Illinois electrician Russell Sprague, who then made digital versions and placed them on the Internet.
The lawsuit also lists 10 unnamed defendants as part of the alleged plot to distribute digital copies of the movies on the Internet.
Caridi could not immediately be reached for comment.
Several newspapers on Thursday also said Sony Pictures, the movie studio wing of Japanese electronics giant Sony, filed a similar suit.
A Sony spokeswoman was not immediately available to comment.
The Warner suit stems from an ongoing battle by Hollywood's major studios to combat piracy of their copyright movies on the Internet, which they claim costs them millions of dollars in ticket sales and could further weaken future revenues.
