As the online battle against file-sharers heats up with governments and ISPs forced into the arena, those opposed to being monitored are investigating counter-measures. Soon the Pirate Bay team will introduce IPREDATOR, a service that promises to make global Internet users more anonymous than with existing VPN services.

As the entertainment industries turn their lobbying power towards ISPs and governments in their on-going battle against file-sharers, more and more people are looking at neutralizing the effects of monitoring and new legislation.

Many file-sharers already pay a few dollars each month for a VPN service. This type of facility allows the user to protect his Internet connection with encryption while “tunneling’ data in privacy through the servers of a VPN provider, usually located in another country. The user’s ISP-designated IP address remains hidden, revealing only a second IP address provided by his VPN company.

This type of service hinders outsiders from finding the identity of an individual behind an IP address, while helping Internet users effectively side-step laws which may prove inconvenient or unpalatable in their home country.

For those who like to share files, one country set to introduce an extremely unpalatable law is Sweden. Due to come into force in just over a week, the controversial Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (IPRED) legislation will make it easier for copyright holders to get their hands on the personal details of suspected illicit file-sharers.

But not if the crew of The Pirate Bay have anything to do with it.

Timed to coincide with the introduction of IPRED on April 1st 2009, a brand new service designed to neutralize the effects of the law will be launched. Dubbed ‘IPREDATOR’, this brand new anonymity service from The Pirate Bay promises to make subscribers “more anonymous” than when using traditional VPN services.

Peter Sunde, aka brokep told TorrentFreak that the service is currently in beta and will be slowly opened to around 500 users. When those users are experiencing the service bug-free, it will be opened up to everyone.

Fortunately the service won’t be limited to just Swedish users. Brokep confirmed that anonymity will be available globally for a modest fee of around 5 euros ($6.77) per month.

The weak link in any VPN/anonymity service is always their willingness (or otherwise) to hand over your customer data when pressured under the law. However, with IPREDATOR this should not be an issue since the service is promising to keep no logs of user activity whatsoever.

Anyone who would like to participate in the beta should sign up here.

Stay tuned for further updates.