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John Wiley has filed papers in New York demanding a trial by jury of four defendants accused of copying its books through BitTorrent, according to a BBC report.
The publisher said the amount of revenue lost through illegal copying of its For Dummies guides was "enormous", with over 74,000 copies of its Photoshop CS5 All-In-One For Dummies guide pirated.
Wiley had previously filed lawsuits to obtain the identities of around 200 people believed to have infringed the copyright of its titles. Wiley's lawyer William Dunnegan told the BBC: "We are asking people who are identified by their ISPs as being copyright infringers to pay the minimum amount due under the Copyright Act as statutory damages. That sum is $750. For the most part people are owning up and complying with the law. However, the named defendants have not."
Were Wiley's claim to reach trial, it would be the first time that evidence against BitTorrent users has been tested in a US court.