Illegal file sharing (more accurately described as copyright infringement) has been plaguing copyright holders since bulletin board systems started and speeds were limited to sub-1 kbps transmission rates. That was the 1980s. Welcome to 2007 where entire movies, television episodes and software packages can be downloaded in their entirety in a matter of minutes.

While the USENET has always been a bastion for file sharers, it wasn't until the original Napster showed up that the RIAA started suing to protect the interest of the music labels. Napster was shut down in 2002, but the publicity it generated also generated clones and other types of file sharing services. One of these, Kazaa, has been the service the RIAA has primarily targeted the users of. The rest is, as they say, history.