Potter Publisher Sues File Sharing Sites

Harry Potter publisher Scholastic has gone to court in an attempt to plug the increasing amount of online leaks ahead of Friday's release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. On the online side, the publisher has filed suit against several peer-to-peer sharing sites and DeepDiscount.com, which had apparently already mailed out its copies of the book, the Los Angeles Times reports.

Approximately 1,200 books are said to have made it to customers' hands early, Scholastic said. In addition to the books being mailed out early, pirated versions of the book were said to be available for download through BitTorrent sites. J.K. Rowling, author of the book, begged those that have received the book early to keep it secret. "In a very short time, you will know EVERYTHING!" a note on her Web site read.