Friday, April 25, 2008 Impact of Taiwan’s new IP law By Clint Fabiosa & Andrew Ong I protect
IN 2004, Taiwan passed a new intellectual property (IP) law, which closed several loopholes on its old IP law.
The new law makes any technology or information used for “circumventing anti-piracy measures” a crime punishable by one-year imprisonment and/or a fine of about P320,000. It also allows Taiwan Customs to impound goods, pending verification of their authenticity.
The new law increased the sentences for counterfeiters and gave judges the discretion whether to impose a fine or commend a violator to prison.
In Taiwan, which is very much similar to the Philippines, most IP pirates welcome the payment of fines and see these as justifiable costs of doing business. The new law imposes penalties, which not only involves payment of a fine between P600,000 to P6 million but also an imprisonment of six months to five years.
These new measures dramatically reduced the incidents of counterfeiting in Taiwan giving consumers more confidence on the branded products they purchase in the market and resulted in more revenues to legitimate businessmen.
