ROME -- Italian authorities have ordered the country's Internet service providers to block access to the Pirate Bay, among the world's largest sites indexing pirated movies and music.

In a bust being hailed as one of the biggest of this type in Europe, Italy's anti-fraud police have issued injunctions and posted official "access denied" seals on Italy's ISPs to block the Sweden-based site, which uses BitTorrent technology.

The Pirate Bay is estimated to allow some 10 million to 15 million users per month to file-share copyright-protected material worldwide. Ironically, only about 450,000 of those users are believed to reside in Italy.

The block, which at this stage is a preventive measure, was prompted by legal action taken by Italy's music industry federation, Fimi. The injunction can be appealed by attorneys for the Pirate Bay, who would be fighting it in a Northern Italian court.

Meanwhile Pirate Bay co-founder Peter Sunde boasted in his blog that the bust is only helping to increase Italo traffic to his site. Sunde claims Pirate Bay has circumvented the block, without specifying how. One possibility could be that Italians may access Pirate Bay via an OpenDNS system, rather than through an ISP.

Pirate Bay also reacted to the bust by issuing a statement on an alternate ISP website, denouncing the move as a fascistic act against freedom of expression.

The Swedish file-sharing site furthermore blasted the block as being dictated by Italo premier and media mogul Silvio Berlusconi as a means to "retain his monopoly" on Italian media.

Italo authorities rapidly reacted to the alternate Pirate Bay website by blocking ISP access to it.

Praising Italo authorities, Fimi topper Enzo Mazza has dismissed the censorship charges.

"Controversy over supposed censorship is a mere ploy to manipulate public opinion away from the fact that Pirate Bay violates Italian criminal law regarding intellectual property; that is why it has to be blocked," he said.

"Italy's judiciary is sending an important signal."

The move has been welcomed by the Intl. Federation of the Phonographic Industry, IFPI, which, along with the MPAA, will be watching this precedent-setting legal battle closely.

http://www.variety.com/article/VR111799 ... id=19&cs=1