SigEx Ventures : China joins FBI in piracy operationby Delia Cruceru

Chinese Police and US FBI captured the world’s largest piracy syndicate. There were arrested 25 people from the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen and the police seized properties worth about $8 million and pirated software of $500 million, according to a FBI statement. The Chinese group was pirating software from Microsoft and Symantec and after that they sold it around the world, including US. David Finn, a Microsoft associate general counsel for anti-piracy and anti-counterfeiting initiatives says: “This is the biggest software counterfeiting organization we've ever seen, and we've been tracking and pursuing software counterfeiters around the world for 15 years," They were captured with the help of a Microsoft tool named Windows Genuine Advantage Notification program launched two years ago, which was prompting to consumers that they weren’t using a legitimate OS. More than 1000 people from 12 countries after receiving this notification found out that their operation system is not valid, and they submitted the installation disc to Microsoft, where forensic investigators traced the southern Chinese syndicate responsible for this counterfeit software. China is the biggest “producer” for pirated software, with 82% of counterfeit software used for personal computers. Bonnie MacNaughton, a senior attorney on Microsoft's worldwide anti-piracy team, said in an interview: “"We believe that these arrests and the seizures associated with them will have significant impact on the distribution of high-quality counterfeit software,"

related story: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/c1407788-3a0e-11dc-9d73-0000779fd2ac.html

by Delia Cruceru for SigEx Ventures (http://sigexventures.com)

SigEx Ventures's matrix of properties are quickly becoming leaders in digital telebroadcasting, free content delivery allowing people to easily talk, view, upload and share through free online TV broadcasting, free unlimited global calls, video blogs and SMS. SigEx Ventures invests in projects deploying "free" to add-on royalty revenue models