Despite progress in government efforts to crack down on commercial piracy and copyright infringement, Taiwanese intellectual property lawyers say much work remains to be done before rampant counterfeiting in electronics and game set chips is wiped out.
The lawyers' comments follow news that US Trade Representative placed Taiwan on a "watch list" in its annual Special 301 review. The US said Taiwan was placed on the list because of its mixed record concerning the protection of intellectual property rights over the past year.
The establishment of Intellectual Property Office (
But action taken to improve access to the judicial system in infringement cases, to enforce existing source identification code regulations and to adopt an effective chip marking system were singled out as areas for improvements.
"Taiwan has made progress in enforcement of protecting intellectual property rights in the past few years," said Winifred Tung (
Tung pointed out that although progress has been made, counterfeiting of CD-ROMs is still rampant.
"The clear marking used on a variety of electronics-related products and game set chips identifying the manufacturing source is an effective method of tracking counterfeiting," Tung said.
"When lawsuits are filed, the marking ID serves to trace whether they were made by legitimate manufacturers."
According to the Intellectual Property Office, 26 copyright infringement cases were reported in a one-day crackdown that occurred April 22. The bust exposed counterfeit goods, pirated software programs and video game discs worth NT$555 million (US$18.3 million).
Nicholas V. Chen (
Chen said the manufacturers of pirated CDs do not respect the copyrights of legitimate owners of music and software, costing the owners billions annually. Furthermore, the trade also puts a negative light on Taiwan.
Furthermore, Chen said, the problem is not getting better. He encouraged the government to provide sufficient resources to enforcement authorities so the problem may be fought.
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