Mp3skull
MP3 file sharing website
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
MP3Skull was a search engine that provided direct download links to MP3 files located on third-party sites. It was founded in 2010 and the site has been the subject of controversy for helping users to find unauthorized copies of copyrighted music.[1]
| Available in | English |
|---|---|
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Users | Over one million per day as of March 2015 |
| Launched | 2010 |
| Current status | Offline |
| Written in | HTML, JavaScript and PHP |
Although MP3Skull was among Alexa's Top 500 websites in 2013, it suffered a drop in ranking due to a Google algorithm update that impacted sites considered to be promoting piracy.[2] In 2016, the RIAA, representing major record labels, won a default judgment against MP3Skull in a copyright infringement lawsuit, resulting in a $22.2 million damages award and the seizure of several associated domains.[3] As of October 2016, the website is offline.
Blocking and censorship
MP3Skull claimed to comply with the DMCA and removes infringing content reported by content owners. On 17 April 2015, a lawsuit was filed against the operators of the website. The music companies involved in the suit asked for $520 million in statutory damages and a permanent injunction that prevents domain registrars and registries from working with the site.[4][5][6][7][8]
It has been speculated that the lawsuit was filed as a way for the record labels to backdoor SOPA and use it further as a precedent to take other domains and websites down.[1] Similar lawsuits against Hotfile and IsoHunt ended with both sites being shut down and settlements of $80 million and $110 million respectively.[9][10]
In October 2015, the website was submitted to USTR as a notorious pirate site by RIAA. According to RIAA, MP3Skull is the most highly trafficked MP3 website of its kind in the world as of 2015.[11][12] As of February 9, 2016, RIAA had requested a total of 1,769,414 URLs on mp3skull.com to be removed from Google's search results.[13][14] RIAA has mentioned the website specifically in their blog as well as in a public forum by CEO Cary Sherman.[15][16]
The site's domain name was changed from mp3skull.com to mp3skull.to early in 2015, and the site has been operating via different domains ever since.[12][17] On 24 February 2016 group of prominent RIAA labels have won a default judgment against the site in a lawsuit started on 17 April 2015. Listing 148 music tracks as evidence, the companies asked for the maximum $950,000 in statutory damages for each, bringing the total to more than $190 million. This award was granted by U.S. District Judge Marcia G. Cooke, who additionally issued a permanent injunction preventing the site's operators from engaging in copyright-infringing activity in the future.[18][19][20][21][22] The site is consequently now offline.[18]
