Fredrik Neij, Peter Sunde and Carl Lundstrom remain guilty of illegal filesharing and have fines increased from $2m to $6.5m

This article is more than 9 years old

This article is more than 9 years old

Pirate Bay's co-founders today lost their appeal against convictions for encouraging illegal filesharing, and have had their collective fine increased by $2m (£1.3m) to $6.5m (£4.1m).

A Stockholm court of appeal ruled that Fredrik Neij, Peter Sunde and Carl Lundstrom remain guilty of helping Pirate Bay users illicitly share copyrighted music and film content via their website.

The Swedish appeals court today reduced each of their prison sentences from one year to between four and 10 months – but raised the amount they have to pay in damages to the entertainment industry to £4.1m from £2.8m.

All four Pirate Bay co-founders were found guilty in April of assisting the distribution of copyrighted content. The fourth co-founder convicted in April, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, did not appear at the appeals court hearings, citing illness.

Following the ruling, Sunde vowed to take the appeal "to the highest court". Posting on Twitter in Swedish, Sunde's message translates as: "It's going to be an appeal to the highest court, so don't worry."

Defence lawyers for Neij and Lundstrom said they were not surprised but disappointed by the ruling and confirmed that they would probably appeal to the European supreme court.

The court's verdict was wrong

, Sunde continued, adding: "They should make a better judgment and read the [evidence files].

"It's a good thing you don't get punished for expressing yourself, but a bad thing you get punished for things that don't exist."

The four Pirate Bay co-founders were ordered to pay damages to 17 different music and media companies including Sony BMG, Universal, EMI, Warner, MGM and 20th Century Fox, having being found guilty of making 33 specific files accessible for illegal sharing.

Neij, 32, must now serve 10 months in prison; Sunde, 32, will serve eight months, and Lundstrom, 50, will serve four. Svartholm, the youngest of the four at 26 years old, will have his case heard at a later date.

Charges against the seven-year-old site were brought by the music trade body the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) on behalf of some of the rights owners.

The trial began on 16 February, at a time when Pirate Bay boasted more than 22 million users a month.

Following their conviction in April all four men, aged between 26 and 50, vowed to fight the ruling, arguing Pirate Bay did not host any copyrighted material itself.

But the Stockholm appeals court today dismissed their legal challenge, stating that the site had "facilitated illegal file-sharing in a way that results in criminal liability for those who run the service".

"For the three defendants the court of appeal believes it is proven that they participated in these activities in different ways and to varying degrees," the court judgment said.

Although Pirate Bay does not itself host copyrighted material, it links to a number of torrents elsewhere on the internet. Early on in the trial prosecutors were forced to drop the charge of "assisting copyright infringement", instead focusing on the lesser charge of "assisting making available copyrighted content".

Rick Falkvinge, leader of the Pirate Bay-affiliated Pirate Party, today said it has been a "political trial from the start and it must be resolved politically".

"This doesn't mean anything for Pirate Bay and it doesn't mean anything for similar sites," he said. "File sharing is increasing every day and the only thing this means is that more and more people will try to hide what they are doing on the internet."

Geoff Taylor, chief executive of UK music sector trade body the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), said the decision confirmed that "far from being a harmless act of digital rebellion, the Pirate Bay is a criminal enterprise to enrich its owners at the expense of musicians and other creators".

The BPI called on internet service providers such as BT and TalkTalk to "act responsibly and stop providing unfettered access to this criminal website".