Intellectual Property Minister Lord Younger and City of London Police Commissioner Adrian Leppard have announced that there is to be a new police unit dedicated to tackling online piracy and other forms of intellectual property crime, such as the marketing of counterfeit goods.
The unit, which will receive funding of £2.5 million over two years from the Intellectual Property Office, is expected to be up and running in September 2013.
Intellectual property crime is costing the UK economy hundreds of millions of pounds each year. Around seven million people a month visit sites offering illegal content in the UK. Globally, it is projected that digitally pirated music, films and software will account for losses of $240 billion by 2015. Internationally traded counterfeited and pirated products are projected to account for between $770 billion and $960 billion globally by 2015.
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