BEIJING — China received more than 400,000 new software copyright registrations in 2016, a year-on-year increase of 39.48 percent, according to a report released on July 14.

Eastern regions accounted for 80 percent of the total registrations in 2016, while western areas saw the fastest increase of 43.68 percent year on year, said the report issued by the Copyright Protection Center of China.

The number of software copyright registrations in Guangdong province overtook those registered in Beijing to top the country for the first time in 2016, the report said.

Registrations for financial software in 2016 increased by 100. 53 percent while registrations for games, education, medicine and cloud computing software saw growth of more than 40 percent year on year, said the report.

China began to register software copyrights in 1992 in a bid to protect the rights of software owners.