You will need to be careful out there if you like to swap music online and you live in the UK...The UK music industry will sue Internet song swappers unless they stop putting their music collections online for others to download, says a top music official. "We want to increase consumer awareness of the legal implications of file-sharing. We want to introduce new legitimate (online download) services. If these are not working, then there has to be a degree of enforcement," said Andrew Yeates, director general of industry association The British Phonographic Industry (BPI).

The comments, made on the sidelines of an industry event Tuesday night, is the clearest statement yet that the European music industry is prepared to follow in the controversial footsteps of the United States. In September, U.S. trade group The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), launched a legal crusade to stamp out Internet piracy by suing individuals who distribute songs on file-sharing networks. Yeates said the legal crackdown would be "proportional," suggesting the BPI would, as the RIAA has in America, go after those who distribute the most songs and leave the occasional file-sharer alone.