Ever since the advent of faster Internet speeds, accessibility to illegally downloaded movies and TV shows has greatly increased. This has hurt the movie and DVD industry and analysts don't see a grand solution in the near future. But now, a study has shown that illegal downloading actually has its roots in organized crime and even terrorism.



In a study commissioned by The Motion Picture Association, the European counterpart of The Motion Picture Association of America commissioned the RAND Corp. to do a study on Film Piracy, Organized Crime And Terrorism.

In their findings, three of their documented cases provide clear evidence that terrorist groups have used the proceeds of film piracy to finance their activities. While this finding is still inconclusive enough, it still shows that intellectual property theft, which is a low-risk high profit operation, is attractive to both organized crime and opportunistic members of local terrorist cells.

In a speech to Silicon Valley executives early last year, former Attorney General Michael Mukasey told them that intellectual property theft poses a threat to the nation's health and safety and fosters terrorism

"Every new technology we create can be abused -- whether it's a common identity thief looking for a new way to steal your bank account information, or an international terrorist looking to advance a murderous plot," the United States' top law enforcement official

The industry is slowly learning how to fight back against movie piracy. While the problem cannot be completely eradicated, they are taking steps to make sure that the industry doesn't die out under the weight of this multibillion dollar piracy scheme

Hollywood studios and the MPAA are determined to protect their products while exploring ways to take advantage of piracy's popularity. Film and TV companies seem to be taking their cue from the Recording Industry Association of America, the music industry trade group, which shut down popular file-sharing program Napster in 2000 after seven years of court battles over copyright infringement. Napster re-emerged three years later as Napster 2.0, a legal music-selling service. Other companies, such as Apple Computers and RealNetworks, are also legally capitalizing on the file-sharing trend.

Some choose to counteract by having special offers if you purchase legal DVDs. DVD Planet for example offers up to 40% discount for selected titles of new DVDs and up to 50% off on used titles. They even throw in free shipping, just to encourage people to buy legal copies of movies.

Still, with the recent economic downturn, you wonder if people would still want to shell out money for something that they can get for free, albeit illegally. And even if America wins the battle against piracy in the near future, the bigger ?pirates? are other countries, particularly Asia and Europe. 3 years ago, half of the estimated $6.1 billion loss of the American movie industry was attributed to piracy in Europe.

So instead of trying to win this futile war, the industry might start thinking about waging a different kind of war altogether.