Hotfile.com offline

Cyberlocker website Hotfile has shut its file-swapping doors, after losing a massive copyright infringement lawsuit brought by Hollywood studios.


Hotfile?s file-sharing service went offline just hours after the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida ordered the website to shut down unless it implemented copyright-filtering technologies to prevent piracy. The court also awarded MPAA $80 million in damages.


?As a result of a United States federal court having found Hotfile.com to be in violation of copyright law, the site has been permanently shut down,? according to a notice on the website, posted late Tuesday. ?If you are looking for your favorite TV shows and movies, there are more ways than ever to get high-quality access to them on legal platforms.?


MPAA sued Hotfile in February 2011. Initially Hotfile fought the copyright-infringement charges, claiming protection under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, but the court rejected that defense.


In a separate case, the MPAA in October reached a settlement to shut down isoHunt, one of the Internet?s largest torrent-directory sites.

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A few hours after news broke that Hotfile had signed a $80 million settlement agreement with the MPAA, the file-hosting service has completely shut down. The drastic decision to deny access to millions of files without warning will come as a shock to the countless individuals who used Hotfile to store their personal and business documents. Hotfile has yet to comment on the controversial move which does nothing to help the image of cloud hosting providers.

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