A gang of software pirates who stole 12m of Microsoft authenticity certificates from East Kilbride printer Thomson Litho in 1998 have been jailed for a total of 11 years (PrintWeek, 31 July 1998).


During a nine-week trial at the Old Bailey in London, the court heard that the gang made millions by selling the certificates to London-based counterfeiters who used them to authenticate their fake software.


A National Crime Squad surveillance operation in 1999 culminated in a series of raids on London business and residential addresses where police found thousands of fake CD-ROMs, packaging material and Microsoft authenticity certificates. These certificates were among a batch of 115,000 snatched in the 1998 break-in at Thomson Litho.


At the trial judge Valerie Pearlam said: "This was a careful and sophisticated fraud from the start."


The raid in July 1998 was the second time in less than a year that Thomson Litho had been raided. In September 1997 masked raiders made off with 200,000 certificates
of authenticity and 100,000 CD-ROMs.


Thomson Litho, which is one of only a handful of UK printers authorised to work on Microsofts software products, declined to comment on the court case.


Story by Sally Nash