In its Monday-filed copyright complaint, Voltage Pictures - the producer of Oscar-winning film ‘The Hurt Locker’ – has accused 5,000 BitTorrent users of illegal sharing of the movie via peer-to-peer networks.

Filed in the federal court in Washington, D. C., the lawsuit claims that the leaking of ‘The Hurt Locker’ on the Internet - six months prior to the official release of the film in the US - via BitTorrent, led to rather poor box office takings of the film, which happened to be less than $17 million.

Despite the fact that the film won critical acclaim and six Academy Awards, Voltage Pictures has argued that there is apparently a direct connection with the ‘leak’ of the film and its somewhat disappointing box office performance.

While the copyright lawsuit filed by Voltage is the biggest lawsuit ever against individuals, Voltage Pictures has stated that the defendants have merely been identified by their IP addresses and the company is yet to know their names.

Intending to send subpoena to the Internet services providers (ISPs) to know the names of the users, Voltage said that once it has identified the users by their name, it will send them letters seeking a settlement. The company will also caution the defendants about a much higher penalty via the legal route, in case a settlement does not work out.