Has the RIAA sued 18,000 people… or 35,000?

Just how many file-sharers has the RIAA gone after? Those in the know were widely reporting a figure just north of 30,000 cases—the RIAA never liked to provide exact numbers—but the music trade group stated in a recent court filing that the real number of people sued is only 18,000. What's going on?

Back in 2006, an article in the Kansas City Business Journal noted that local law firm Shook Hardy & Bacon (the firm that first contacted Jammie Thomas-Rasset) would no longer be handling the RIAA's litigation campaign. The paper quoted an "RIAA spokeswoman" as saying that the group had pursued 18,000 separate defendants. (As we'll see later, this may have been a misunderstanding.)

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