Editorial alliance mulls lawsuit against Apple

An alliance of publishing houses and periodicals are considering filing lawsuits against Apple for offering pirated content of their works on its App Store, a senior official of the China Written Works Copyright Society said on Friday.

"We will support the move by the publishing houses and periodicals to defend their rights against Apple," Chen Jiangong, president of the society, said at the International Seminar on the Collective Management of Copyright in the Digital Environment held in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province.

Zhang Hongbo, director general of the society, said the lawsuit could be filed "very soon" but he declined to reveal the list of the publishing houses and the amount of the compensation.

The United States tech giant has recently been entangled in similar controversies.

On Sept 27, the Beijing Second Intermediate People's Court ruled that Apple must pay the Encyclopedia of China Publishing House 520,000 yuan ($82,670) in compensation due to the unauthorized use of a digital version of part of the Encyclopedia of China. The digital version was available via the company's App store.

Apple appealed against the ruling earlier this month.

Last month, the same court heard a lawsuit filed by eight Chinese writers against Apple due to the unlicensed sale at its App store of electronic versions of their books. The writers demanded compensation of 10 million yuan.

No verdict has been announced yet.