Police Raid Major Corporations, SMEs in Latest Software Piracy Raids
Results of Police Raids Show that All Companies are Accountable for following the Thai Copyright Act
Police Promise More Raids in Months Ahead
BANGKOK (March 5, 2010) – A wide variety of companies, both large and small, were raided this month for use of unlicensed software, a violation of the Thai Copyright Act. From companies with hundreds of millions of baht in registered assets and listings on international stock exchanges to local SMEs with only a few dozen employees, police officers from the Economic and Cyber Crime division added to their string of consistent raids against companies using unlicensed software.
Police allege that a German company’s plant in Samut Prakarn used unlicensed software to design industrial laundry washing and drying machines. According to police, the value of the Autodesk software allegedly pirated by the company is 700,000 baht. On the same day, police raided a Thai SME in food and electronic goods industry for using pirated AutoCAD software in designing and installing clean rooms at several company plants. The value of software infringement is also approximately three-quarters of a million baht.
On the day following the raid of two manufacturing companies in Samut Prakarn, police officers from the Economic and Cyber Crime Division raided two companies in Chonburi. One of these companies is part of South Korean industrial group with global assets of more than US$600 million and the other is a Japanese company with registered assets of 110 million baht. The estimated value of the infringed software allegedly used by these companies is 1.6 million baht and 876,000 baht respectively.
Another two major corporations and two SMEs were also faced police raids for suspected software piracy this month. Directors of these companies hold liability for the software copyright infringement, and face possible fines and jail sentences.
Those who report the use of unlicensed software by calling 02-714-1010 or by reporting it on line are eligible to receive an award of up to 250,000 Thai Baht. The identity of the caller is protected. More information is available online at
www.stop.in.th.