<p>Abstrakt: Den illegala fildelningen har blivit ett omdiskuterat ämne runt om i världen sedan fildelningstjänsten Napster skapades av unge Shawn Fanning. På senare år har flera nya fildelningstekniker utvecklas och upphovsrättskyddat material delas ut och laddas ner av hundratusentals tals personer runt om i Sverige. Syftet med rapporten är att ge en beskrivning av tekniker och lagar som tillämpas inom illegal fildelning. Samt att beskriva olika aktörer som figurerar inom den illegala fildelningen och vilka åtgärder de tillämpar för att fortsätta och skydda sin verksamhet.</p> / <p>Abstract: Illegal file sharing has become a hot topic around the world. The topic has been heavily discussed since the young Shawn Fanning created the file-sharing service Napster. In recent years many new file sharing technologies has been developed and copyrighted files is now shared and downloaded by hundreds of thousands of peoples in Sweden.</p><p>The thesis purpose is to give a description of technology and laws which are applied in the area of illegal file sharing. And also to describe different actors which appear within the area of illegal file sharing and which measures they apply to continue and protect their activities.</p>

Abstrakt: Den illegala fildelningen har blivit ett omdiskuterat ämne runt om i världen sedan fildelningstjänsten Napster skapades av unge Shawn Fanning. På senare år har flera nya fildelningstekniker utvecklas och upphovsrättskyddat material delas ut och laddas ner av hundratusentals tals personer runt om i Sverige. Syftet med rapporten är att ge en beskrivning av tekniker och lagar som tillämpas inom illegal fildelning. Samt att beskriva olika aktörer som figurerar inom den illegala fildelningen och vilka åtgärder de tillämpar för att fortsätta och skydda sin verksamhet. / Abstract: Illegal file sharing has become a hot topic around the world. The topic has been heavily discussed since the young Shawn Fanning created the file-sharing service Napster. In recent years many new file sharing technologies has been developed and copyrighted files is now shared and downloaded by hundreds of thousands of peoples in Sweden. The thesis purpose is to give a description of technology and laws which are applied in the area of illegal file sharing. And also to describe different actors which appear within the area of illegal file sharing and which measures they apply to continue and protect their activities.

The pilot study used in this thesis examined the attitudes and perceptions of a small group of students at the University of North Texas. The participants in this pilot study (n=22) were administered an online music file sharing survey, a Defining Issues Test (DIT), and participated in a small focus group. This thesis also outlined the history and progression of online music piracy in the United States, and addressed four research questions which aimed to determine why individuals choose to engage in the file sharing of copyrighted music online.