For protection of IPR, anti-piracy taskforce is achieving effects
E030427Y6 May. 2003（E44）
Despite that US is still complaining of the IPR protection task conducted by Taiwan, in fact the task conducted by Taiwan’s government, which has spared no efforts for the latest three years in protecting intellectual property rights, is achieving effects and preventing infringements upon intellectual property rights from increasing yearly. It is believed that Taiwan will ultimately get ride of the notorious name of “Pirate Kingdom” by virtue of the amendments and enforcement of laws, as well as education.
In order to enhance the task of combat against piracy and infringement upon intellectual property rights, the Prosecutor’s Office of Taiwan High Court held progress evaluation meetings for the project of protecting intellectual property rights responsible for reporting the progress of the investigation conducted by prosecutors, policemen and criminal investigators on infringement upon intellectual property rights on a regular basis. Meanwhile, National Police Administration also formed the Integrated Enforcement Task Force, drastically increasing the police dedicated to infringement upon intellectual property rights from 100 to 220 persons. Further, the Prosecutor’s Office of High Court and Investigation Bureau conducted raid actions against counterfeits throughout Taiwan simultaneously, and the manpower dedicated to the raid actions was unprecedented.
According to the statistics of National Police Administration, the police’s performance in raid against infringement upon intellectual property rights for past five years is manifested in a numerical order, i.e. 1,748 cases in 1998, 2,568 cases in 1999, 4,304 cases in 2000, 5,270 cases in 2001, 5,188 cases in 2002 and 458 cases in January – March in 2003. Apparently, the number of infringement cases in Taiwan has no longer increased yearly, and even has decreased, as a result of the government’s efforts.
The most prominent one of the tasks conducted by the government, which is also most attractive to copyrighters, is nothing else other than the Draft of Amendments to Copyright Law as drawn up by the Executive Yuan which defines that offense against piracy is no longer subject to indictment only upon complaint. This Amendment is greatly applauded by the pop music industry that has suffered the damage brought by piracy for a long time. The pop music industry also hopes that the police and judicial authorities can enforce the law strictly so as to eradicate counterfeits and piracy. Nevertheless, Taiwan’s continuous dedication to strengthening the protection of intellectual property rights also arouse some objections and disputes over fair use of intellectual property rights. Some experts in law believe that the increase in criminal penalty against piracy can only resolve the piracy problem temporarily but is unable to cure it thoroughly, if the authority merely increases the criminal penalty without investigating into the causes of rampant piracy. In terms of relevant laws applied by other countries, few countries, except Germany, USA and Taiwan, define that the offense against copyright infringement is subject to public prosecution.
