On April 28, 10 officers from the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs (MDTCA), with the support from Malaysian Federation Against Copyright Theft (MFACT), representing the Motion Picture Association (MPA) in Malaysia,raided a US$37.8-million-a-year burner lab in a mega industrial area of Kajang, a town located about 30km south of Kuala Lumpur, seizing 238 DVD-R burners.

This is the thirteenth burner lab that has been taken down this year. MDTCA officers also seized 25,000 blank DVD-Rs and 14,000 DVD-Rs, amongst them were MPA member company titles ?Alvin and the Chipmunks?, ?National Treasure: Book of Secrets? and ?10,000 BC?.

The DVD-lab raided was believed to have been in operation for about six months. It is estimated that the lab had a production capacity of more than 12.8 million pirated discs, potentially generating criminal revenues of more than US$37.8million.

Earlier on the same day, MDTCA raided a pirate DVD warehouse in the same industrial area, seizing 200,000 pirated DVDs, including MPA member titles such as ?10,000 BC? and ?Street Kings?. The premises was believed to be used by the pirate syndicate as a center for storage, packaging and distribution.

Mike Ellis, President and Managing Director, Asia-Pacific for the Motion Picture Association said, ?We once again commend the aggressive action taken by the MDTCA. Despite these measures, the pirates continue to proliferate. We will continue to step upour joint efforts with the Malaysian authorities to clamp down on these syndicates.?

Piracy in Asia

A comprehensive study aimed at producing a more accurate picture of the impact thatpiracy has on the film industry including, for the first time, losses due to internet piracy, recently calculated that the MPA studios lost US$6.1 billion to worldwide piracy in 2005.About US$2.4 billion was lost to bootlegging, US$1.4 billion to illegal copying and US$2.3 billion to Internet piracy. Of the US$6.1 billion in lost revenue to the studios, approximate US$1.2 billion came from piracy across the Asia-Pacific region, while piracy in the U.S. accounted for US$1.3 billion.