A Chinese court has sentenced four people to jail for selling pirated versions of Microsoft’s Windows XP operating system.
A Suzhou city court has sentenced Hong Lei and Sun Xianzhong to the three-and-a-half year term as well as a fine of $176,000, with two others given two-year jail terms.
The court heard that the four offenders offered the free download to about 10 million users, and even gained money for internet advertisements. The company which ran the website, Chengdu Gongruan Networking Technology, was also ordered to pay a fine of about $100,000.
The sentence comes after 11 software pirates were sentenced to six and a half years in prison last year for distributing over two billion dollars’ worth of fake Microsoft products.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Patrick Stafford is a freelance journalist and a former deputy editor of SmartCompany.
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