On the afternoon of August 4, the newly appointed Economic Section Chief of American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) N. Rashad Jones with Specialist Lisa Yang visited Taiwan High Prosecutors Office (THPO) and its Intellectual Property Branch Office (THPO-IPB), Chief Prosecutor Chang received the guests in person, accompanied by Head Prosecutor Chen Wen-chi, Prosecutors Lo Hsueh-mei and Chu Shuai-chun.
Chief Procurator Chang expressed his welcome to Mr. Jones and noted that the United States and Taiwan have maintained a good cooperative relationship in jointly combating crimes and mutual legal assistance for many years that achieved remarkable results. It is also expected that the law enforcement cooperation between the two sides will be expanded and deepened in the main tasks currently handled, such as drug control, detection of telecom frauds, tracing of money laundering, intellectual property rights and trade secrets protection. Mr. Jones mentioned the necessity of law enforcement cooperation between Taiwan and the United States as well and pointed out the importance of intellectual property rights (including trade secrets) protection, as it was related to industrial development and investment protection. In addition, Chief Prosecutor Chang and Mr. Jones exchanged in depth views on the use of emerging network technology in conducting virtual currency frauds, money laundering and blockchain issues, and hoped that exchanges and cooperation between the two sides in scientific and technological investigation will be strengthened.
After the talks, Mr. Jones visited the Tech Crime Investigation Center of THPO where Prosecutor Huang Li-wei, Prosecutor’s Assistant Tsao Tseng-hao and colleagues of the Center introduced digital identification, polygraph, technology research and development, cryptocurrency trail breakthrough, tech monitoring, criminal database analysis and other functions applied to investigation practice to improve case-handling efficiency. Then Mr. Jones visited the multi-functional investigation room in THPO-IPB. Head Procurator Chen Wen-chi briefed the organization and functions of this Office, and procurators Lo Hsueh-mei, Chung Feng-ling, Chu Shuai-chun and Huang Pei-yu participated in the exchange meeting.