Several movie studios say three UAF residents downloaded bootlegged copies of films last semester without paying for them, according to the UA Information Technology Office. The movie studios call that theft.

The studios say the downloads included "Syriana," the critically acclaimed political drama starring George Clooney; "Four Brothers," starring Mark Wahlberg; and HBO's epic television series "Rome," according to a list the technology office provided.

Cara Duckworth, a spokesperson for the Motion Picture Association of America, said in an email that "Syriana" and "Four Brothers" were in demand because they are relatively new releases.

"Usually the larger the film at the box office, the greater the chance of piracy," Duckworth said.

UAF received the complaint about the downloading of "Syriana" on Dec. 11, just two days after its general release. Some of the complaints came earlier.

The studios have asked university officials to stop the three students from downloading, a request UAF has to follow under federal law.

UAF has reacted by contacting the students about the complaints. On Oct. 5, Residence Life sent Payton Snider, 20, a letter stating HBO had accused him of distributing "Rome" without permission.

The letter accused Snider of theft of property or services, a violation of the student code of conduct. UAF shut off his internet connection until he could prove to a technician that he had removed the show and the file-sharing program BitTorrent from his computer.

Snider said he downloaded the series because HBO isn't available at UAF. HBO found him through his computer's IP-address.

"I was kind of weirded out that they were able to trace it back to here," he said.

Asked if the incident has stopped him from downloading movies, Snider said, "It deterred me from downloading from HBO."

UAF declined to release the names of any of the students accused of piracy because doing so would violate federal privacy provisions. The Sun Star found Snider through word-of-mouth.

Since November 2004 the MPAA has filed hundreds of lawsuits against downloaders, Duckworth said.

Analysts at the brokerage company Smith Barney estimated at the beginning of 2005 that the film industry could lose $5.4 billion from all forms of piracy, including downloads.

Last semester was the first time UAF received complaints about illegal downloading of television shows, said Kevin Huddy, director of Residence Life. No new complaints have come in the past month, he added.

Signs indicate that downloading bootlegged copies of movies continues to be a popular campus activity. As of last Sunday, 61 residential computers had exceeded 10 gigabytes of file transfers, the maximum the university allows in a month, according to the UAF Toptalker list, an online report on bandwidth use.

Huddy said he knew of only one time where a max-out did not involve peer-to-peer file-sharing programs.

"We've had guys that bust their monthly allocation in a matter of minutes," Huddy said.

In 2001, a freshman, Gabe Ramuglia, reportedly transferred more than 1.3 terabytes, or 1,300 gigabytes, of files using the UAF network system.

High bandwidth usage in the dorms became so much of a problem last year that the university almost instituted a residential network fee, Huddy said.

The fee would have been separate from the network charge, a 2 percent fee that students already pay that is based on tuition.

Movies made up only a small portion of UAF students' illegal downloading last semester, with only 10 complaints lodged for other types of media, such as music and software, according to Kerry Digou, chief information technology security officer.

The Recording Industry Association of America maintains that eight songs were illegally downloaded at UAF last semester, Digou said. Titles included Black Eyed Peas' "My Humps," Usher's "Nice and Slow," Sean Paul's "We Be Burnin'" and Kanye West's "Gold Digger."

The University of Alaska system received 141 complaints of copyright infringement in 2005, down from 159 in 2004, according to UA computer-incident reports. At least 42 of last year's 141 complaints involved UAF, records show.

Devin Boyer, director of information services at ASUAF, said the decline in complaints suggests that more students are using legal means, such as iTunes and Napster, to obtain music. Either that or they are being craftier about their downloading, he said.

"They're trying to stay one network ahead of the MPAA, RIAA, or whoever it is," Boyer said.