Features
Number of pirated CDs nearly doubled in 2001, industry says
LOS ANGELES – Worldwide sales of pirated music CDs nearly doubled last year to a record 950 million units, an industry trade group said Tuesday.
Illegal shipments came from large manufacturing plants and small garage operations around the world, according to the International Federation of Phonographic Industries, which represents 1,400 record producers and distributors in 76 countries.
Illegal recordings of music, meanwhile, which may have been put on CD or cassette, totaled nearly 2 billion in 2001, up just slightly from a year earlier. The figure means that two out of every five recordings sold worldwide in 2001 was an illegal copy.
Illegal music sales outnumbered legal sales in 25 countries, compared with 21 countries a year earlier, the group said.
China, Russia and Brazil led the world in piracy. Ninety percent of all music sold in China is pirated, according to the federation.
Sales of pirated materials around the world amounted to $4.3 billion, up from $4.2 billion in 2000.
