Dutch anti-piracy organisation Brein has announced that it will begin pursuing legal action against individual BitTorrent users who share copyright infringing content.
In a press release, Brein said that it will track down pirates, and offer them settlement charges of “up to EUR12,500” per title.
The Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens (national data protection authority) granted Brein permission to collect the IP-addresses of pirating BitTorrent users, allowing the group to approach uploaders on a broader scale.
However, Brein remains dependent on ISPs to link the IP addresses to names and personal data. So fra, they have resisted handing over the names and addresses of these people.
Illegal file-sharing is widespread in the country, According to research by the Telecompaper Consumer Panel shows that 35% of the Dutch admit to downloading content without paying for it.