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City Of London Police commander celebrates PIPCU, calls for more global collaboration on tackling IP crime
By Chris Cooke | Published on Thursday 25 September 2014
The City Of London Police’s National Coordinator For Economic Crime, Steve Head, has bigged up his force’s IP Crime Unit, or PIPCU, and called for more co-operation worldwide to tackle intellectual property crime.
Head spoke at the snappily named International Law Enforcement IP Crime Conference in Vietnam, an event co-hosted by Interpol (not the band, obviously), and told delegates from around the world about the work PIPCU has been doing, both in the UK and beyond, since the specialist unit was launched a year ago.
Listing in particular successes achieved in targeting individuals and groups who profit from copyright and other IP infringement online, Head urged other countries around the world to consider specialist IP crime teams, who could collaborate to target online infringing operations which usually transcend borders.
Speaking to reporters after his speech, Head said: “PIPCU is a pioneer in the way it is tackling intellectual property crime, moving away from traditional policing methods to embrace new and innovative initiatives to disrupt and dismantle the criminal networks responsible for causing huge damage to legitimate businesses”.
He went on: “This work includes close collaboration with private sector organisations inadvertently supporting IP crime either through advertising or allowing payment provision on websites that are providing illegal access to copyrighted material. At the International Law Enforcement IP Crime Conference I urged delegates to support and engage with PIPCU and to look at its strategy for policing IP crime as a potential way forward for themselves and partner agencies”.
