Defendants Added to File-Sharing Lawsuit

U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson of Los Angeles agreed to let the movie and music industries expand their copyright infringement lawsuit against Kazaa and two other leading file-sharing networks, adding Sharman Networks and five other new defendants.

Based in the South Pacific island of Vanuatu, privately held Sharman Networks distributes the Kazaa software and owns its Web site.

The other new defendants are Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis, who launched Kazaa, and three companies linked to Sharman or Zennstrom and Friis.

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Jon Healey