Pop star Prince is threatening to sue a number of websites which he claims are pirating his music and videos.

YouTube, eBay and Swedish search engine The Pirate Bay have been named as possible targets for the legal challenge.

"Very few artists have ever taken this kind of action over their rights," said a spokesman for the musician.

"Yet Prince has shown time and time again that he is ready to challenge the system in new ways to put artists and music first."

The 49 year-old artist has asked for more than 2,000 videos currently uploaded on YouTube to be removed.

Prince is being represented as part of an anti-piracy campaign by Web Sheriff, which monitors the internet for copyright breaches. The company hopes to attract other major stars to its movement.

YouTube has promised to introduce video fingerprinting technology to scan videos for copyrighted material.

The video-sharing website has previously faced pressure from Viacom and a group representing Japanese copyright holders to take down copyrighted material.

Viacom has since mounted a legal challenge seeking more than $1bn in damages.