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Five Internet Pirates Nabbed in Anti-Piracy Operation
Posted on Tuesday, August 02, 2005 - 12:00 AM

Early this morning, Police arrested 4 men and a woman, aged between 23 to 41 years old for peddling pirated materials on the Internet. The subjects were arrested in their respective residences. About 1600 infringing optical discs along with an assortment of computers, storage mediums, electronic gadgets and paper entries were also seized for purpose of investigations.

2. The Intellectual Property Rights Branch (IPRB) received information that 4 online users were operating illegal businesses involving the sales of pirated movies optical discs on a particular online auction site. The perpetrators offered a wide range of movie titles for sale and their auction postings have been popular amongst Internet surfers.

3. Preliminary investigations revealed that the perpetrators would put up their wares for sale via the said auction site. Thereafter, they would contact the bidders online and request for the latter to transfer the money to their bank accounts via the Internet Banking or ATM transfer service. Upon receipt of the monies, they would then purchase the pirated movie optical discs from overseas and send the discs to the bidders via mail. One of the perpetrators even duplicated the movies onto CD-ROMs using his home personal computer which are then resold to the bidders. Despite the risks involved in engaging such illicit activities, the perpetrators made an average of $100/- to $400/- a month.

4. This operation is part of police enforcement efforts with rights owners in tackling Internet piracy. The Police and rights owners will continue to mount operations against criminals who think they can exploit the faceless and anonymous features of the Internet to ply their trade.

5. Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Tan Kah Khin, Head of the Intellectual Property Rights Branch of Criminal Investigation Department said, ?Predominantly, the ground sentiments amongst these Internet pirates are that their identities are safe behind their computer monitors and they can never be caught. They will be in for a surprise as the Police will spare no effort to hunt down any Internet pirates with a blatant disregard for intellectual property rights laws.?

6. Persons found guilty of selling or distributing infringing articles of any work in which copyright or trademark subsists, are liable to a fine not exceeding $10,000/- per article, and up to a maximum fine of $100,000/-, or to an imprisonment for a term not exceeding 5 years or to both.

PUBLIC AFFAIRS DEPARTMENT
SINGAPORE POLICE FORCE
2 August 2005

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