THE music industry served notice yesterday that it is beginning to win the battle against internet piracy, providing fresh evidence that illegal file swapping has levelled out while legitimate sales over the web trebled over the past year.

IFPI, the global music trade body, said in its latest report on piracy that the number of files illegally exchanged over the internet increased by 3 per cent to 900 million between January last year and June 30, compared with a 13 per cent rise in high-speed broadband internet connections.

IFPI also said that the number of legal tracks downloaded from legal music websites around the world increased from 57 million in the first six months of last year to 180 million in the first half of this year. Although a fraction of the total number of songs sold around the world, the industry said the growth justifies widespread excitement surrounding digital distribution.

“We had no business in this space four years ago, so it clearly is becoming very important and will be even more so in the future,” Barney Wragg, senior vice-president of Universal Music Group’s new media and technologies unit, said.

IFPI, whose members include all the major music companies, among them EMI of Britain and Warner Music Group of the US, said that legal music downloads in the first six months of this year outstripped the total for the whole of last year. The surge has been led by Apple Computer, whose iTunes music store sold its 500 millionth track this week.

“We are containing (piracy) within the enormous rise of broadband,” a spokesman for IFPI said. “Although there’s a long way to go we’re seeing that the rise of legal downloads and the fall of illegal downloads are creating two lines that will eventually meet.”

The spokesman said “all the evidence” pointed to several waves of lawsuits against music pirates as the primary reason for the slowdown in the trade of counterfeit music. “Whether it’s the fear of getting caught breaking the law, or the realisation that many networks could damage your home PC, attitudes are changing, and that is good news for the whole music industry,” John Kennedy, IFPI’s chairman, said.

The record industry has targeted thousands of music pirates over the past two years, including dozens in the UK and hundreds across Europe.

IFPI claims piracy is behind a global slump in music sales that began in 2000. Worldwide sales were flat last year as a drop in audio sales was offset by increases in music DVD and digital music sales. Sales in the US, the largest market, have improved slightly since late 2003.

But the trade group gave no further details on its battle against physical music piracy, which accounted for one of every three discs sold in the world last year, depriving record companies of $4.6 billion (£2.6 billion) in turnover. That fight is not yet being won, with fake recordings outselling legitimate copies in a record 31 countries.

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