content="开云·云开(中国)Kaiyun·官方网站 - 登录入口"/> 2024-11-19[Patent Filing, Trademark Filing]Pirated Foreign Textbooks Worth “30 Million in Copyright Infringement” Sold for 100 NTD; Caught in the Act - 台灣仕誠國際專利商標事務所-專利申請及商標服務-TaiwanPatentFilingTaiwanTrademarkFiling-台灣特許出願商標出願

2024-11-19[Patent Filing, Trademark Filing]Pirated Foreign Textbooks Worth “30 Million in Copyright Infringement” Sold for 100 NTD; Caught in the Act

2024-11-19 14:14 China Times News Network
[China Times, Ren Yiyu]
Third division of the Intellectual Property Investigation Team of the Criminal Investigation Bureau, according to the “Operation Against Infringement of Educational Material Intellectual Property” recently discovered someone selling foreign professional textbooks in subjects such as finance, accounting, and chemistry on an online platform, wherein each textbook, originally priced at over NTD 10,000, was being sold in digital format for only NTD 100. After confirmation of copyright infringement by authorized distributors, the third division cooperated with New Taipei City Police Department and apprehended a suspect, surnamed Wu, in Shulin. Due to the infringement amount exceeding NTD 30 million, the case has been referred to the New Taipei District Prosecutor’s Office for investigation under copyright law violations.

The Third Division stated that, in coordination with the Taiwan High Prosecutors Office’s second-half-year operation “Combat Infringement of Educational Material Intellectual Property”, they identified a suspect, surnamed Wu, involved in selling professional textbooks published by foreign publishers on an online shopping platform. After forming a special task force with the Banqiao Precinct of the New Taipei City Police Department and conducting long-term evidence gathering, the suspect was apprehended on August 27 at a location in Shulin District, New Taipei City.

It is understood that the textbooks pirated by Wu were originally from foreign publishers, including Pearson Education Ltd. (UK), Cengage Learning (USA), and John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (USA). The content of these textbooks primarily consists of professional materials in fields such as finance, accounting, and chemistry. The average retail price of each book ranges from NTD 1,000 to NTD 3,000, with some priced at over NT$10,000 each one.

Wu obtained the digital content of the textbooks through certain channels and created PDF files, which he sold online for only NT$100 per copy. After being apprehended, Wu claimed that professional textbooks were purchased by only a small number of college students, making them very difficult to sell. He stated that his total profit was only around NTD 5,000.

The police stated that they seized electronic files of dozens of textbooks at Wu’s residence, totaling 12,334 pages of PDF documents, along with a laptop and other evidence. According to estimates by the Taiwanese distributors of the textbooks, the infringement’s market value exceeded NTD 30 million. Wu has been referred to the New Taipei District Prosecutor’s Office for investigation under charges of copyright law violations.

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