A U.S. federal jury has ordered a woman to pay $222,000 to six record companies that sued her for downloading and sharing copyrighted music online.
The jury in the northern state of Minnesota on Thursday ordered Jammie Thomas, 30, a single mother of two, to pay more than $9,000 for each of 24 recordings the case focused on.
In the first case of its type to go to trial, the record companies accused Thomas of downloading and sharing songs through an online service called Kazaa. In her defense, Thomas said she never had an account with the service.
Recording companies have brought more than 26,000 lawsuits against music downloaders since 2003, in an ongoing campaign against piracy.
Despite their efforts, the practice of online file-sharing continues to increase.
Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.