Days after the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) submitted a list of "notorious markets" to the Office of the US Trade Representative, the music industry followed up by listing several online sites that enabe copyright infringement.
The RIAA's list is comprised of "rogue websites" that "line the pockets of their operators without paying a cent to creators behind the content."
Chinese search giant Baidu, the No. 1 search engine able to reach an estimated 430 million Internet users, is the first target on the RIAA's list. Baidu has been heavily criticized by copyright holders that accuse the search engine of easily granting access to pirated content.
Russia's VKontakte (Russian Facebook equivalent) has also been listed, with the popular social networking site doing little to prevent pirated material from being shared among its users.
The RIAA also has problems with The Pirate Bay, isoHunt, BTjunkie, Torrentz, and Demonoid. The MPAA didn't include Torrentz with its list, even though the site is a torrent search engine that links to numerous infamous torrent sources. The full list and letter can be found on TorrentFreak.
The MPAA has previously submitted a note to Kira Alvarez, USTR Chief Negotiator and Deputy Assistant for Intellectual Property Enforcement.
It's unknown what the USTR plans to do with the information compiled by the RIAA and MPAA -- especially when services based in China, Russia, and other locations care very little about copyright issues. Copyright cases in China and much of Eastern Europe are not high priorities and piracy groups are able to operate without much threat of a crackdown.
After President Barack Obama was elected, there was immediate uncertainty about the music and movie industries influence on government officials, which has yielded more progress as of late in their anti-piracy campaigns.
