Free music streaming service Grooveshark is (unofficially) back online.

A clone of condemned website Grooveshark is now live at Grooveshark.io, allowing users to keep accessing the vast amount of copyrighted music files that drew the ire of major record labels and eventually led to the original website’s demise. Grooveshark was shut down last week following a six-year legal battle. The site was reportedly facing up to $736 mllion in statutory damages at a trial that was about to commence.

The replica website was created by a user operating under the pseudonym of Shark. Shark claims to have started backing up Grooveshark’s content after suspecting the site was about to go offline. The mysterious user claims to have backed up 90% of Grooveshark’s original content, and is currently tracking down the remaining 10%. Shark has also assembled a team dedicated to restoring the sites original features, including playlists and favourites.

“I was connected to Grooveshark a few years back and I have, together with the team I’ve gathered, the knowledge and the technological abilities to bring it back to life,” Shark told The Verge.

Unlike the original site, Grooveshark.io does not allow users to upload their own music. The new replica instead claims to be a music search engine that trawls the web for music files hosted elsewhere. This may help the new replica escape the wrath of major labels in the short term, but the long term future of Grooveshark.io remains uncertain. [via The Verge]