Twentieth Century Fox, the motion picture studio owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., has subpoenaed Google's YouTube in an effort to identify who uploaded pirated copies of its TV programs to the popular video site.
The Fox shows included episodes of "24" and "The Simpsons," the "Wall Street Journal" reported.
Filed Jan. 18 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, the subpoena asked YouTube to disclose the identify of the subscriber so Fox could stop the infringement, the "Journal" reported.
The newspaper said the four-episode season premiere of "24" appeared on the site ahead of its scheduled broadcast, and that 12 episodes of "The Simpsons" were being distributed as well.
After Fox notified YouTube about the episodes, the pirated shows were removed from the site.
