Case 10 Criminal case of copyright infringement by “selling pirated online games”

 [Basic Information]

Case No.: (2018) Beijing 0108 Criminal First Instance No. 1932

Public Prosecution Institution: Beijing Haidian People's Procuratorate

Defendant Unit: Jushi Online (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd.

Defendant: Huang Ming

[Case Brief]

Since 2016, Huang Ming, along with others, operated the game “Jushi Hainan Mahjong”, which had highly identical source code with that of “Xianlai Qiongya Hainan Mahjong”, copyright of which being enjoyed by Beijing Xianlai Huyu Network Technology Co., Ltd (hereinafter referred to as “Xianlai Huyu”), without the permission of Xianlai Huyu, and obtained illegal profits in the way of selling virtual currencies for start of the game by agency personnel; the illegal profits totaled RMB 162,912.9 yuan. Huang Ming was arrested on December 16, 2017. The public prosecution institution initiated a public prosecution to the court of first instance on September 21, 2018, believing that the act of Jushi Online (Beijing) Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Jushi Online”) and Huang Ming violated Articles 217 and 31 of the Criminal Law and constituted the crime of infringing copyright, and requested the court to impose punishment according to the law. Li Yong, the representative of action of Jushi Online, did not raise any substantive objection to the facts and charges of the indictment. Huang Ming did not raise any objection to the facts and charges of the indictment. The court of first instance held that Jushi Online and Huang Ming, its directly responsible manager, copied and distributed the computer software that others enjoyed copyright without the permission of the copyright owner for the purpose of seeking profits, the circumstance was severe and their act constituted the crime of infringing copyright, therefore shall be punished. The criminal facts charged by the public prosecution institution were clear, the evidence was credible and sufficient, and the crime charged by the public prosecution institution was proved. Considering that Huang Ming truthfully confessed to his basic crimes after appearing before the court, Jushi Online and Huang Ming showed repentance, and Jushi Online voluntarily withdrawn its illegal gains, the defendants should be given a lighter punishment according to the law. The court made a judgment that Jushi Online committed the crime of infringing copyright and should be imposed on a fine of RMB 200,000 yuan; Huang Ming committed the crime of infringing copyright and should be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of one year together with a fine of RMB 100,000 yuan. After the first-instance judgment was pronounced, neither Jushi Online nor Huang Ming appealed.

[Comments]

With the rapid development of the Internet economy, intellectual property crimes have gradually spread from real life to cyberspace, especially to the field of online games on mobile terminals. In recent years, among cases involving crimes of infringing computer software copyrights, the number of cases in which online game works were copied and “knock-off” mobile online games were operated for illegal gains has increased significantly. Most data of such piracy and infringement were stored in servers or the cloud, and separation of the way of obtaining illegal gains from accounts of the operating companies of pirated websites was applied to evade detection. Xianlai Huyu, victim in this case, is a well-known chess and card mobile game company combining research and development and operation, the game involved is also a well-known mobile game with a wide range of players, and piracy of the suspect produced a bad impact on the society. In addition, after the incident, the suspect attempted to evade punishment or diminish responsibility by tampering with and destroying data and accounts, which led to damages to the electronic amount used for determining the main income from operating game currencies by the company and once brought great difficulties to the judicial work. This case mainly used the income of third party agency companies from selling “star diamond gifts” and other virtual currencies for start of the game for the defendant company to determine the amount of crime of the defendant unit, and fully utilized data of new-type e-commerce payment platforms and new features of marketing patterns of mobile games to clarify and judge the electronic evidence of such new type of crime. It established the rule of verifying criminal circumstances by data of third-party platforms, and had a modeling significance for combating such new types of crimes that intentionally evade inspection.

hoto from: iqilu.com