The nation's software piracy rate remained at 43 percent last year, the fourth consecutive year it has been at that level, according to a report issued by Business Software Alliance (BSA) Taiwan on Tuesday.
This means the government has to step up efforts to crack down on piracy and ensure that all government agencies use only authentic software, the alliance said in the statement.
As a result of the piracy, Taiwan suffered NT$17 billion (US$531.87 million) in losses from 2002 to last year, according to BSA's Global Software Piracy Study, which was conducted by the research firm International Data Corp.
Although the nation's piracy rate remained unchanged, the good news is that the country had the third-lowest software piracy rate in Asia (excluding New Zealand and Australia) last year.
Japan's rate was the lowest at 28 percent and Singapore was the second-lowest, at 40 percent, it said. Vietnam had the highest software piracy rate, at 90 percent, followed by Indonesia with 87 percent and China and Pakistan with 86 percent each.
The average software piracy rate for the Asia-Pacific region was 54 percent last year, while average rate for the world was 43 percent, the report said.
In a campaign from March 15 to April 30, BSA Taiwan offered rewards of between NT$1 million and NT$10 million to encourage people to report companies using illegal software.
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