Web pirates give 'Snatch' top billing on downloads

LONDON - Guy Ritchie's gangster flicks have the unlikely honour of being the most pirated films in the world, a survey of movies swapped by internet users suggests.

Snatch, which was found on more than a million computers, was downloaded more times last month than Pearl Harbor, Traffic, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider or any other American blockbuster, says Mediaforce, an anti-piracy research company based in New York.

Snatch was the only surprise on the list. The others in the top 10 - Shrek, The Matrix, Gone in 60 Seconds, Hannibal, Gladiator, X-Men - were big-budget Hollywood productions.

Each time a film is downloaded represents a potential loss to the film industry. The Motion Picture Association of America estimates piracy costs its studios more than $US2.5 billion ($6.1 billion0 annually - though most is from organised gangs making cheap video copies.

But Mediaforce's finding underlines the increasing problem film studios are having in preventing the spread of digitised versions of films over the internet.

"At least three of the top 10 in our list are current hits," said Aaron Fessler, Mediaforce chief executive. "They haven't been released on DVD or VHS. But then we realised that people must be taking digital camcorders into films."

Film studios face the same problem as the music industry did with the Napster system, which at one time claimed more than 40 million users trading MP3 files free.

"Movie piracy is going to be a massive problem in the next few months," said Fessler.

- INDEPENDENT