UK fans can copy music for private use

Downloaders can only be penalised if they make duplicate songs for other people

The threat of prosecution for copying music from a CD onto a PC or MP3 player no longer hangs over UK music fans, as long as it is for their own use.

Peter Jamieson, chairman of the British Phonographic Industry, said that consumers can only be penalised if they make duplicate songs for other people.

"I want to make it unequivocally clear to the consumer that if they copy their CDs for their own private use in order to move the music from format to format we will not pursue them," Jamieson told the Commons Select Committee for Culture, Media and Sport.

"We believe that we now need to make a clear and public distinction between copying for your own use and copying for dissemination to third parties."

Jamieson also called for Apple to open up its iTunes software to make it compatible with other manufacturers' technologies, stating that he did not believe Apple's dominant share in downloads was "particularly healthy".

Home counterfeiters account for the majority of investigations made by The Federation Against Copyright Theft and the British Phonographic Industry.

Earlier this week an influential group of UK MPs called for " crystal clear" labelling of digital music and video content to let consumers know what they can and cannot do with such purchases both online and offline.