Hollywood’s six major film studios Monday unveiled a technology venture to find new ways of protecting movies from illegal copying and distribution in black markets or over the Internet.

Motion Picture Laboratories Inc., or Movielabs, will look for new technologies to detect illegal videotaping of films in theaters and evaluate new computer hardware and software that is being used by networks to distribute films.

The venture’s goal is to discover technologies that combat piracy then recommend their use to universities, companies, Internet service providers and other network operators, the groups said in a statement from the Motion Picture Association of America.

The movie studios figure they lose as much as $3.5 billion a year in revenues due to the illegal copying of movies on videotape and DVD, and they are deeply concerned about possible further losses due to digital distribution via the Internet.

Movielabs founding owners are Walt Disney Co’s Walt Disney Pictures and Television, Viacom Inc’s Paramount Pictures, News Corp Inc’s Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp, Sony Corp’s Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc., General Electric Co.’s Universal City Studios and Time Warner Inc Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

The new venture will be headquartered in Los Angeles and operate as an independent, non-profit corporation.

Source: CNN Tech: http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/09/20/film.piracy.reut/index.html