Thought #21
April 2009
Author: Bill Thurston
Modern Piracy
Modern pirates haven't changed much from times past. Their activities and
behavior are almost the same as they were 100s of years ago. As
you will see piracy is alive and well all over the world.
What is piracy?
Piracy is the
unlawful taking of personal property with intent to deprive the rightful owner
of it permanently. There are two
types of piracy:
1. Robbery on the high seas.
2. The unauthorized use of another's production, invention, or conception
especially in infringement of a copyright. This includes the illicit accessing
of broadcast signals.
What types of pirates exist?
The two types of modern pirates are independent
pirates and organizations of
pirates. Independent pirates are mostly interested in loot and, if on the
high seas, the safe of the ship they attack. They work for themselves.
Organized pirates are groups connected to other similar groups with some overall
purpose in mind like supporting a religious, government, or some monetary goal.
These pirates rob to fulfill their part of the overall business.
Piracy on the high seas.
Piracy on the seas has been increasing over the last 30 years. Between 1993 and
2003 the number of attacks tripled, and during the first half of 2004, there
were 200 cases of pirate attacks reported worldwide.
Today's pirates of the seas use modern tools like speed boats launched from
mother ships, radar, sonar, and
GPS. Their weapons include machine-guns, torpedoes, rocket propelled grenades,
and more.
Hostages are now commonly taken for ransom. No one reveals how much ship
owners pay to get the crew back, but it is estimated to be over $1 Million per
crew member.
Well, a picture is worth 1000 words, so here is a picture of the world and
pirate attack locations. This information is published by the
International Chamber of Commerce Commercial Crime Services. There is other good
information about piracy on this website:
Piracy Map
Piracy: The unauthorized use of another's production, invention, or conception
especially in infringement of a copyright.
This type of piracy is called
intellectual property theft. On the electronic side, it includes stealing
copyright protected digital copies of things like music, movies, software, and
games and distributing them through websites, chat rooms, mass email, FTP, and
peer-to-peer networks.
There is also the "knockoff" products which are copies of brand name products.
They fall into categories like
deluxe watches, designer clothing, pharmaceutical products, food and drink,
medical equipment, personal care items, toys, tobacco and automotive parts.
Common names to copy are Coke, Corona Beer, Starbucks, Nike, Gucci, Kentucky fried
Chicken, Rolex, and much more.
According to a report by The Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development, the financial magnitude of piracy is enormous. Click on the link
for report details.
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/21/20/40896133.pdf .
Analysis in this report indicates that international trade in pirated products
could have been up to $200 billion in 2005. This total does not include
domestically produced and consumed counterfeit and pirated products and the
significant volume of pirated digital products being distributed via the
Internet. If these items were added, the total magnitude of counterfeiting and
piracy would be over $600 billion a year or 5%-7% of all international trade. To
put this into perspective, if all pirate activity represented a country, they
would be the18th largest county in the world.
Here is another great map showing
Counterfeiting Seizures in 2009:
Thought
After looking at both the piracy and
counterfeiting maps (see links above), it seems to show more physical forms of
piracy in less developed parts of the world and less physical forms of piracy in
the developed parts of the world. In the developed parts of the world, pirates
steal intellectual property. Maybe there is a lesson here in how we should look
at our security.
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