Apple has been hit with a fine after selling an unauthorized work via its iBookstore. China's Writer's Right Protection Union sued on behalf of three authors who had their works published on the iBookstore platform. The Beijing No. 2 Intermediate People's Court ruled in favor of the Union, stating that Apple didn't verify the publishers had the right to upload the works.
The writers involved this time include Mai Jia, whose books are often on best-seller lists across the country. In this way, Apple has the capability to know the uploaded books on its online store violated the writer's copyright.
So, how much was Apple fined for this neglect? 730,000 yuan, or about $118,000. Small potatoes for a company like Apple, but it does start to add up after awhile. It's likely not large enough to encourage Apple to implement real change to prevent something like this from happening again. Real change would involve hiring more people, which costs money.