With the federal government having shut down Megaupload on charges of copyright infringement, scammers betting on the gullibility of former Megaupload users are trying to make a sleazy payday. According to TorrentFreak, users of Megaupload have received letters from a non-existent German law firm called "Dr. Kroner & Kollegan," which claims to be acting on behalf of copyright holders Universal, Sony, EMI, Warner, and Dreamworks.

Legal threats against Internet users who share copyrighted files are not unheard of, so former Megaupload users may be legitimately concerned. But TorrentFreak, which posted a screenshot of the fake letter (written in German), notes a few points that help show it's fake.

"Supported by fake IP addresses and timestamps, the scam ‘lawfirm’ lays out its case," TorrentFreak reports. "Since the user has downloaded unauthorized copyrighted material from Megaupload they are now liable for fines of 10,000 euros should the case not be dealt with effectively. But for a payment of just 147 euros the whole thing can be made to go away. Other suspicious elements aside, no specific copyright works are named and the claim is missing the usual ‘cease and desist’ element common to these schemes."

Users who fall for the scam would end up making cash payments to an address in Slovakia. It's unclear how the scammers are identifying former users of Megaupload. While the site was well-known for its users sharing pirated content, we noted in a story after Megaupload was shut down that it had numerous legitimate uses as well.

Separately, TorrentFreak said another group of scammers is using malware to trick file-sharers into paying 50 euros to avoid being sued for copyright infringement. The scammers in this case are posing as a German anti-piracy group that helped take down several file-sharing sites.