Submitted by: kirkland on Thursday July 17th, 2003 at 11:36 AM EST

The Recording Industry Association of America on Wednesday said it sent out subpoenas to Internet service providers, in preparation for lawsuits it plans to file against hundreds of individuals who illegally distribute songs over the Web.

"This should not come as a surprise to anyone. Filing information subpoenas is exactly what we said we'd do a couple of weeks ago when we announced that we were gathering evidence to file lawsuits," said a representative for the RIAA, the music recording industry's leading trade body.

Sharply escalating the industry's battle against online piracy, which had so far focused on shutting down peer-to-peer services, the trade group in late June said it would track down the heaviest users of these services and sue them.

Under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, ISPs are required to provide copyright holders with such information when there is a good-faith reason to believe their copyrights are being infringed, according to attorneys for the RIAA.

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