A report from analyst house JupiterResearch discovered that consumers are three times more likely to get their digital music from illegal file-sharing networks than pay to download the tracks from online song shops such as iTunes and Napster, with 15 percent of consumers using P2P sites and five percent using the legitimate online shops.
The taste for illegal music is strongest amongst the young. Of those consumers aged between 15 and 24, 34 percent are illegal file-sharers and, according to the report, have little concept of music as a paid commodity.
Mark Mulligan, analyst at JupiterResearch, said that despite the growth in legal sales from services like iTunes, as well as legal actions against uploaders, illegal file-sharing is here to stay.
"There's nothing to suggest illegal file-sharing is going to go away," he said. "It's a firmly entrenched behaviour and the fact it's free makes it more difficult."
However, the problem is not purely a digital one -- young people are happy to get their music illegally whatever format it's available on.
JupiterResearch found that 43 percent of younger consumers prefer copying CDs to buying them and 40 percent believe that CDs aren't value for money.
According to Mulligan, the music industry needs to rethink how it deals with young file-sharers. "There needs to be a sea-change in approach," he said. "Instead of [the industry] paying lip service to legal services... there needs to be a whole new layer of free legal services," such as ad-supported downloads, he said.
