The website isoHunt.com today agreed to halt all operations worldwide in connection with a settlement of the major movie studios? copyright lawsuit against the site and its operator Gary Fung. As part of the settlement, the parties have jointly asked the court to enter a judgment of $110 million against the defendants. The settlement also includes a global prohibition against Fung further profiting from the infringement of MPAA member studio content.

IsoHunt.com is one of the most popular BitTorrent sites on the Internet; it claims to offer 44.2 million peers, 13.7 million active torrents.

The settlement in Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. v. Fung comes after a three - judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a unanimous decision on March 21, 2013, affirming the district court?s 2009 ruling against isoHunt for "inducing" users to illegally download and distribute the MPAA members' movies and TV shows over the BitTorrent peer-to-peer network.Further, the appellate court affirmed that isoHunt and Fung were not protected by the "safe harbor" provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

"Today's settlement is a major step forward in realizing the enormous potential of the Internet as a platform for legitimate commerce and innovation," said Senator Chris Dodd, Chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). "It also sends a strong message that those who build businesses around encouraging, enabling, and helping others to commit copyright infringement are themselves infringers, and will be held accountable for their illegal actions."

A representative of isoHunt wasn't immediately available for comment.