One of Hollywood's biggest foes is about to be called on the carpet. After years of steering Web surfers to free entertainment, the organizers of a massive directory of pirated movies, music and software in Sweden could finally face serious legal repercussions.

Based on evidence collected in a 2006 raid on the offices of The Pirate Bay, Swedish prosecutors say that by the end of January they expect to charge the individuals who operate the file-sharing service with conspiracy to breach copyrights.

While Sweden might seem to be an unlikely harbor for pirates of any kind, weak copyright laws, lax enforcement, high broadband penetration and general antipathy toward the entertainment industry have made it a file-sharing free-for-all. Last year, 43% of the people participating in a survey by Sweden's biggest phone company said they planned to download music during the year. A pro-piracy political party has more members than the Greens.

The prosecutors' move comes after years of complaints from Hollywood executives and U.S. government officials. U.S. Embassy officials have described Sweden as home to the "worst Internet piracy in the world," and the Motion Picture Association of America has been fighting to shutter Pirate Bay's site for years.

Sweden, which enjoys some of the world's fastest Internet speeds, strengthened its laws in 2005 to make online theft of movies a crime. But its efforts to crack down have had little success so far. In 2006, shortly after Swedish Justice Department representatives visiting Washington received a stern lecture from U.S. officials about the alleged damage being caused by Pirate Bay, Swedish police raided the site's offices and shut it down.