More than half the computer software being used in Hong Kong is pirated, a lobby group for the software industry says.
A study by the Business Software Alliance, which is funded by software giants such as Microsoft and lobbies governments to legislate against piracy, found 54 per cent of software running on computers in Hong Kong last year was pirated, up from 52 per cent in 2004.
'This is the most surprising and disappointing result for our survey in the Asia-Pacific,' the alliance's Asian director, Jeffrey Hardee, said yesterday. 'We would like to think Hong Kong could do more by working with businesses.'
The mainland recorded the biggest decline in the world in the use of pirated software last year. But the 4-percentage-point drop still meant 86 per cent of software on computers there was pirated, the fourth-highest proportion in the world. Only Vietnam and Zimbabwe, with 90 per cent of software pirated, and Indonesia, on 87 per cent, were bigger offenders.
Worldwide, 35 per cent of software installed on all computers was illegal last year. The lobby group said peer-to-peer file-sharing software was now the principal means of accessing pirated software.
Mr Hardee expected the mainland's rate of software piracy to fall again this year as new laws making it illegal for any government department to use pirated software came into force.