The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is being given a taste of its own medicine by peer-to-peer (P2P) company Altnet, which has launched a civil suit against the trade body alleging patent infringement.

Altnet is partly owned by Sharman Networks, which developed the Kazaa P2P site, and sells music, movies and video games through P2P sites.

It has accused the RIAA and a number of other companies of infringing its copyright as they try to enforce copyright laws regarding P2P sites.

Altnet and its parent company Brilliant Digital Entertainment allege that every time the RIAA or its contractors post spoof versions of songs in P2P sites they violate Altnet's patented technology for identifying files on the networks.

"Altnet alleges that some of the defendants infringe on its patents to spoof P2P users with bogus or corrupted media files," the company said.

"Altnet alleges that this has inhibited the growth of P2P for legitimate file sharing that benefits copyright holders (which Altnet advocates), and thereby has injured its business."

Kevin Bermeister, chief executive at Altnet, said in a statement: "We have exhausted every means of trying to work with these defendants and those they represent to patiently encourage and positively develop the P2P distribution channel.

"We cannot stand by and allow them to erode our business opportunity by the wholesale infringement of our rights."

The RIAA did not respond to request for comment for this article.