About 80 per cent of people believe copyright piracy is a serious problem and more than half say it is morally wrong.
But more than half said they had bought the goods anyway, a government survey has found.
More than 1,000 people were interviewed in the Intellectual Property Department-commissioned study. Most admitted they knew they were doing something wrong when they bought fake goods ranging from VCDs to business software.
'Consciousness has changed, but behaviour has not,' Director of Intellectual Property Stephen Selby said.
'Our community has a very high recognition that it's morally wrong to buy counterfeit goods and that it's damaging to Hong Kong. So our message now has to be, 'come on, get real: do something about it'.' He said the budding hi-tech industry could not take off unless people respected intellectual property.
Twenty-one per cent said they sometimes bought pirated articles, while 34.5 per cent said they seldom did. Only 36.6 per cent said they had never bought any.
