Warner Bros. Records and Madonna [ tickets ]'s manager are threatening legal action after a track from the singer's forthcoming album was leaked over the Internet. The album, "Music," is not due to be released until late summer.

"This music was stolen and was not intended for release for several months," said Caresse Norman, Madonna's manager, via a statement issued by Warner Bros on Thursday (6/1). "It is still a work in progress. Ultimately, those sites that offered a download of Madonna's music are violating her rights as an artist."

"Any site that posts or makes available our copyrighted material without our consent runs the risk of civil and criminal prosecution under existing Federal law and State common law," added Warner Bros. "We expect that the site owners who have included this material on their site will comply immediately with our legitimate request that they cease permitting unauthorized downloads of this song."

A spokesperson for Warner Bros. Records declined to comment on how the song may have been leaked initially, how long the company would wait to take action if sites leaking it do not comply, and what legal action would be taken in the event of noncompliance.

One fan site, Madonnapower, posted a statement on Thursday (6/1) stating that Warner Bros. had contacted the site directly and had asked that the song be removed. "We therefore are not able to provide this MP3 anymore," said the statement.

Meanwhile, messages dating back to Saturday (5/27) on alt.fan.madonna--an Internet newsgroup--indicated that Napster users had been trading the song via Napster's controversial MP3 file-trading software.

"It's all over Napster right now, folks," read one such message posted on Sunday (5/28). "Some [MP3 files] are incomplete, two-minute versions, but many are the 3:27 [minute] version."

A search of the files available for trade via several Napster file-sharing servers on Thursday afternoon turned up no instances of the new song.