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The Court of Final Appeal today (May 18) dismissed the appeal of an appellant, who had been convicted and sentenced to three months' jail for uploading infringing movies to the Internet by using the BitTorrent peer-to-peer file-sharing program.
The Court of Final Appeal ruled that the appellant, by using the BitTorrent peer-to-peer file-sharing program to upload infringing movies to the Internet for other Internet users to download, had plainly succeeded in distributing the infringing copies; hence, he was correctly convicted of the offences under the Copyright Ordinance. The court dismissed the appeal.
The Assistant Commissioner of Customs and Excise, Mr Tam Yiu-keung, said Hong Kong Customs welcomed the ruling of the Court of Final Appeal. The judgment confirmed that uploading of infringing copies of copyright works to the Internet by using the BitTorrent peer-to-peer file-sharing program for downloading by other Internet users was a criminal offence under the Copyright Ordinance.
"The ruling will generate a strong deterrent effect on Internet piracy activities," Mr Tam said.
Hong Kong Customs will continue its 24-hour monitoring of infringement activities on the Internet, in particular, copyright piracy involving the use of peer-to-peer file-sharing programmes.
Under the Copyright Ordinance, a person commits an offence if he/she, without the licence of the copyright owner, distributes an infringing copy of a copyright work otherwise than for the purpose of trade or business to such an extent as to affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright. The maximum penalty is a fine of $50,000 per infringing copy and imprisonment for four years.
Hong Kong Customs reminded people to stay away from copyright infringement activities on the Internet. If people came across any suspected online piracy activities, they were encouraged to report to the Customs by calling the 24-hour hotline 2545 6182.
Ends/Friday, May 18, 2007
Issued at HKT 15:03
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