The world of illegal downloading suffered a severe blow Thursday when Swedish authorities charged four people for operating the world's most popular BitTorrent site – The Pirate Bay– which allows users to retrieve free movies, music and video games, much of which is copyrighted.

Those charged include Hans Fredrik Neij, Per Svartholm Warg, Peter Kolmisoppi and Carl Lundstroem. According to charges lodged in Stockholm, the four are accused of "promoting other people's infringements of copyright laws."

The four face a potential year in jail.

The Bay has been on the authorities' watchlist for years.

In June, 2006, a police raid shuttered it for three days after the authorities confiscated its servers, which were later moved to the Netherlands. The raid sparked street protests in Sweden, which has some of the loosest copyright laws in Europe, and gained the site an immense international and mainstream presence.

"The investigation into The Pirate Bay by the Swedish authorities has been extensive and we are happy to rely on the judicial process to reach a just decision in this case," said Motion Picture Assocation of America spokeswoman Elizabeth Kaltman.

Hours later, Kaltman told THREAT LEVEL that the MPAA had complained to Swedish authorities: "We made criminal complaints about Pirate Bay's well-known activities," Kaltman said. "Thereafter the entire investigation was in the hands of the police and local authorities."

In a statement, prosecutor Hakan Roswall said the site produces about $4 million in revenue annually.

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"The operation of The Pirate Bay is financed through advertising revenues. In that way, it commercially exploits copyright-protected work and performances," he said.

The Pirate Bay's popular blog has this comment posted.

"In case we lose the pending trial (yeah right) there will still not be any changes to the site. The Pirate Bay will keep operating just as always. We’ve been here for years and we will be here for many more."

An older post notes this recent milestone.

"We've got reasons to celebrate. Millions of them!" the blog read. "This week we've hit the magic numbers. We're tracking over 1 million torrents. We have had over 10 million simultaneous peers on the trackers. We're at 2.5 million registered users (and they are active as well). And this is blog post 100!"

The site's popularity has grown in the wake of the recent shuttering of Isohunt, TorrentSpy and other BitTorrent tracking sites to U.S.-based traffic. Those sites, rather than abide by a court order and turn over to the Motion Picture Association of America information on its American users, blocked their access to protect their users' privacy.

The Pirate Bay allows users to search for and download indexed torrents, which contain the information needed to download data containing the copyright-infringing content from other users of the service.

"The operators of The Pirate Bay have always been interested in making money, not music. The Pirate Bay has managed to make Sweden, normally the most law abiding of EU countries, look like a piracy haven with intellectual property laws on a par with Russia," said John Kennedy, chairman and chief executive of International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, which represents the recording industry worldwide.

"We welcome the filing of these charges in Sweden," he continued. "The evidence presented by the prosecutor shows that The Pirate Bay, which claims to be motivated by idealism, is really motivated by making money."

E-mail to The Pirate Bay were not immediately returned.

Regardless of what happens to The Pirate Bay, illegal downloading is expected to flourish. When sites are taken down, others pop up.

Last year, for example, the popular OINK music file-sharing site was shuttered by the authorities. In its wake, Waffles emerged with thousands of music sharers.

(Image: Pirate Bay defendants Gottfrid Svartholm and Fredrik Neij in a 2006 photograph. Wired News/ Quinn Norton)

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