MPAA TAKES PIRATES TO COURT GROUP FILES 7 SUITS AGAINST ONLINE SELLERS.

Byline: Greg Hernandez Staff Writer

The Motion Picture Association of America said Tuesday that it has filed seven lawsuits in Los Angeles federal court against online auctioneers in four states who they allege have been selling counterfeit DVDs of popular movies such as ``Batman Begins'' and ``Million Dollar Baby.''

``People who abuse online auction sites like eBay to sell counterfeit DVDs are not only cheating their buyers, they are committing a crime and will be held accountable,'' said John G. Malcolm, the MPAA's executive vice president and director of worldwide anti-piracy operations.''

Individuals operating online auctions in California, Illinois, New York and Texas were targeted in the lawsuits which are part of the MPAA's overall efforts to combat piracy on the Internet.

``Our goal is to raise awareness and protect unsuspecting consumers from dishonest auctioneers in the online marketplace,'' Malcom said. ``Profiting from the sale of someone else's creative property is illegal, and we will not tolerate any form of copyright theft.''

Other movie titles involved in the lawsuits include ``Sideways,'' ``Stealth,'' ``13 Going On 30,'' ``Scooby Doo,'' and ``Ice Age.''

The MPAA estimates its member studios - including Warner Bros., Disney, Sony, 20th Century Fox and Paramount - lost $3.5 billion in 2005 due to hard-goods piracy. When including Internet piracy, a study conducted by Smith Barney estimated the total loss to be $5.4 billion.

EBay spokesman Hani Durzy said Tuesday that the company has worked closely with the MPAA in its efforts to protect the intellectual rights of the studios.

``What this shows is if you are going to try and break the law by selling pirated DVDs, eBay is probably not the place to do it because you are probably going to get caught and we'll help catch you,'' Durzy said.

The MPAA is among the 14,000 entities who are part of a program where they report listings to eBay that they say are in violation of their copyright. The online auction site has also developed filters that make the listings more easy to navigate in searches for intellectual property theft.

``We don't allow and don't want counterfeit product on the site,'' Durzy said. ``It's not good for business and it's not legal.''

Here are some of the tips offered by the MPAA to help consumers avoid buying pirated movie titles:

--Watch for titles that seem too new to be true. They have either not been released in theaters or are still showing in theaters and are not yet available on home video.

--You get what you pay for and the extremely low prices offered on some Web sites could be a sign of a pirated product.

--When the movie arrives in the mail, inspect the DVD and look for signs that it is a fake. Indicators could be a slip sleeve cover of inferior quality or the absence of studio logos on the disc and on the packaging.

The MPAA advices customers to keep their receipts, print out a copy of their orders and hang on to them until their DVDs arrive and are in usable condition.

The MPAA said it seized more than 76 million illegal discs in 2005 as part of its multipronged approach that also includes educating people about the consequences of piracy, working with law enforcement authorities to root out pirate operations and working to ensure movies are available legally using advanced technology.

Greg Hernandez, [phone]

greg.hernandez(at)dailynews.com