Piracy profits linked to terrorism

US Attorney General, Michael Mukasey has warned that the huge profits generated from piracy and counterfeiting are fostering terrorism.

Terror groups are taking their cues from organised crime and funding their operations with money they make committing intellectual property crimes, he told a gathering of Silicon Valley executives.

"Criminal syndicates, and in some cases even terrorist groups, view IP crime as a lucrative business and see it as a low-risk way to fund other activities," Mukasey said. "A primary goal of our IP enforcement mission is to show these criminals that they're wrong."

Mukasey, who did not elaborate and did not take questions, said his department was devoting increasing resources to prosecuting such crimes and filed 7 percent more IP cases in 2007 than in 2006 and 33 percent more than in 2005.

Before the speech, Mukasey met privately with representatives from companies including Apple and Adobe Systems.