After a year-long crackdown on commercial piracy, the nation has successfully had its name removed from the IFPI's watch list of 10 countries with high piracy rates, the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) said yesterday.
The IPO quoted this year's IFPI business piracy report as saying that Taiwan was no longer among the 31 countries that the IFPI found to have larger domestic sales of pirated music CDs than of genuine copies last year.
The IFPI represents the recording industry worldwide with over 1,450 members in 75 countries and affiliated industry associations in 48 countries.
One-third of the music CDs sold in markets around the world last year were pirated copies, representing 1.2 billion copies at a total value of US$4.6 billion -- a figure which does not include illegal downloading from the Internet, according to the IFPI report.
Besides Taiwan, Canada and South Korea were also taken off the list due to their improved piracy situation.
Meanwhile, in the latest assessment by the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA), a coalition of associations representing US copyright-based industries, the nation saw losses of some US$320.4 million in the recording business due to piracy over the past year, for a drop of 31 percent from the previous year's figure.
The IIPA also assessed that the nation's movie piracy rate decreased from the 44 percent registered in 2003 to 40 percent last year, while the music piracy rate dropped from 42 percent to 36 percent, according to the IPO.
Taiwan is to receive the first batch of Lockheed Martin F-16 Block 70 jets from the US late this month, a defense official said yesterday, after a year-long delay due to a logjam in US arms deliveries. Completing the NT$247.2 billion (US$7.69 billion) arms deal for 66 jets would make Taiwan the third nation in the world to receive factory-fresh advanced fighter jets of the same make and model, following Bahrain and Slovakia, the official said on condition of anonymity. F-16 Block 70/72 are newly manufactured F-16 jets built by Lockheed Martin to the standards of the F-16V upgrade package. Republic of China
Taiwan-Japan Travel Passes are available for use on public transit networks in the two countries, Taoyuan Metro Corp said yesterday, adding that discounts of up to 7 percent are available. Taoyuan Metro, the Taipei MRT and Japan’s Keisei Electric Railway teamed up to develop the pass. Taoyuan Metro operates the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport MRT Line, while Keisei Electric Railway offers express services between Tokyo’s Narita Airport, and the Keisei Ueno and Nippori stations in the Japanese capital, as well as between Narita and Haneda airports. The basic package comprises one one-way ticket on the Taoyuan MRT Line and one Skyliner ticket on
Many Japanese couples are coming to Taiwan to obtain donated sperm or eggs for fertility treatment due to conservatism in their home country, Taiwan’s high standards and low costs, doctors said. One in every six couples in Japan is receiving infertility treatment, Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare data show. About 70,000 children are born in Japan every year through in vitro fertilization (IVF), or about one in every 11 children born. Few people accept donated reproductive cells in Japan due to a lack of clear regulations, leaving treatment in a “gray zone,” Taichung Nuwa Fertility Center medical director Wang Huai-ling (王懷麟)
A pro-Russia hacker group has launched a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack on the Taiwanese government in retaliation for President William Lai’s (賴清德) comments suggesting that China should have a territorial dispute with Russia, an information security company said today. The hacker group, NoName057, recently launched an HTTPs flood attack called “DDoSia” targeting Taiwanese government and financial units, Radware told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). Local tax bureaus in New Taipei City, Keelung, Hsinchu and Taoyuan were mentioned by the hackers. Only the Hsinchu Local Tax Bureau site appeared to be down earlier in the day, but was back
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