Music labels fight German ‘rip off’

The music industry on Monday sued a German technology company for allegedly distributing MP3 files it ripped from videos streamed on YouTube.

PMD Technologie UG, in a process known as stream-ripping, illegally removed the audio tracks from various YouTube videos and then converted them to easily downloadable MP3 files — which it then distributed through its site, called YouTube-mp3.com, the lawsuit claims.

The practice of stream-ripping is a blatant rip-off of the labels’ copyrights. The practice grew by 50 percent between 2013 and 2015, according to the suit, filed by 16 music labels. The suit seeks to shutter the site, YTMP3, which is run by PMD boss Philip Matesanz.

The tracks are distributed on the adsupported YTMP3 site for free, according to the suit.

“The scale of the defendants infringing activity is enormous,” with tens of millions of users, according to the lawsuit. The labels allege that the service is responsible for more than 40 percent of tens or hundreds of millions of tracks illegal stream-ripped on YouTube.

Roughly 57 million music fans are ripping off artists by using unauthorized services, it is alleged. The suit also seeks damages of $150,000 per downloaded track.