April 16th, 2008 by Matt Fisher
Acorn Engineering Company (www.acorneng.com), a manufacturer of stainless steel fixtures, has agreed to pay $250,000 to the Business Software Alliance (BSA) to settle claims that it had unlicensed copies of Adobe, Autodesk and Microsoft software on its computers.
In addition to the payment, the company agreed to delete all unlicensed copies of software installed on its computers, acquire any necessary replacement licenses and commit to implementing stronger software license management practices.
In the US, software piracy can result in damages of up to $150,000 for each software title copied. The BSA currently offers up to $1,000,000 in rewards for whistle-blowers who report software piracy.
Posted in License Compliance, BSA, Piracy |
April 14th, 2008 by Matt Fisher
The Business Software Alliance has launched a campaign to target software piracy in Manchester, UK. According to the licensing watchdog, the city has the worst piracy rate in the UK outside of London.
During May and June, Manchester businesses will be asked to take part in a “software healthcheck” to assess their own status.
The BSA says that companies that take part in the healthceck will not face further investigation, while those that do not participate may find themselves the recipients from an unwelcome visitor.
In the UK, software license enforcement now comes under the remit of Trading Standards, which has the power to raid businesses suspected of committing software piracy.
Posted in License Compliance, BSA, Piracy |
April 4th, 2008 by Matt Fisher
Having spent years aggressively fighting MP3 piracy, it is somewhat ironic that a recent raid on the company has led to a small software house suing the music giant for 300,000 Euros ($471,000 / £235,600). PointDev claims that it found Sony BMG was using unlicensed software after a support call was logged using a pirated keycode.
PointDev claims that Sony BMG had been using the pirated software since 2004.
Posted in Piracy |
April 3rd, 2008 by Matt Fisher
The Federation Against Software Theft (FAST) declared war on software pirates in the UK following the announcement in the USA that the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) has initiated 17 legal actions against online sellers of allegedly pirated software.
The Federation is also calling for more sensibility and accountability among purchasers, saying that business applications being sold for a fraction of their retail price should automatically raise suspicion among buyers. The body warned that it is not just private individuals purchasing software from sites such as eBay, but also corporate users - who are potentially putting their organization at a greater risk of fines for piracy or non-compliance.
Posted in License Compliance, Piracy, FAST |
