Anti-Piracy getting serious

Below is a story from the 25th of August.

Four men have been jailed in China for creating and distributing piracy software for Microsoft Windows XP.

The "Tomato Garden Windows XP" blocked the operating system's authentication programmes and enabled users to access it for free.

The software was created by Hong Lei, who was handed a prison sentence of three-and-a-half years by a court in Suzhou, eastern China, according to the state news agency Xinhua.

Another man was given the same sentence, and two others were jailed for two years in what was termed the biggest software piracy case in the country.

Hong and his accomplices distributed the version through a portal called tomatolei.com which made money through internet advertisements.

Although the case was widely publicised by China as a sign of its efforts to control piracy, many say more needs to be done.

US Congressman Howard Berman of California, who is in Beijing to meet Chinese leaders, said in a statement: "China's efforts to stop intellectual property theft have been weak and ineffective - heavy on tough talk but light on implementation."

As you can see anti piracy has started getting serious. This is one of the first serious sentences against piracy and the largest case of it's kind in China. Similar to the "thepiratebay" case this is a lethal message to all those going against the huge corporations such as Microsoft and making something worth billions of $$$ free via some clever coding.