Computer Crime (Software piracy)

SOFTWARE PIRACY

The copyright infringement of software (also known as software piracy) refers to several practices when done without the permission of the copyright holder:

- Creating a copy and/or selling it. This is the act that some people refer to as "software piracy". This is copyright infringement in most countries and is unlikely to be fair use or fair dealing if the work remains commercially available. In some countries the laws may allow the selling of a version modified for use by blind people, students (for educational product) or similar. Differences in legislation may also make the copyright void in some jurisdictions, but not the others.

- Creating a copy and giving it to someone else. This constitutes copyright infringement in most jurisdictions. It is not infringing under specific circumstances such as fair use and fair dealing.

- Buying the original software. Licenses never say that the buyer does not buy the software but instead pays for the right to use the software. In the US, the first-sale doctrine, Softman v. Adobe and Novell, Inc. v. CPU Distrib., Inc. ruled that software sales are purchases, not licenses, and resale, including unbundling, is lawful regardless of a contractual prohibition. The reasoning in Softman v. Adobe suggests that resale of student licensed versions, provided they are accurately described as such, is also not infringing.

and others.

The effects of copyright infringement on digital culture

Software piracy is illegal due to the perceived economic loss it inflicts on the copyright owner. Even if it is assumed that only a portion of those infringing the author's copyright would ever have bought the software, the author will still suffer an economic loss as a result.

Software authors suggest that copyright infringement negatively affects the economy by decreasing the profits that allow for further development and growth within the software industry. The U.S. is the country most affected, as they provide about 80% of the world's software. Software counterfeiting is claimed to be a large problem by some, resulting in a revenue loss of US $11-12 billion, China and Vietnam being the biggest offenders.

It has been suggested that counterfeit software will decline so much as to be eliminated in the future, but there are measures being taken and rules being put into place to work towards this goal. "In the United States, for example, the level of piracy has been reduced from 48% in 1989 to 25% in 2002." Rise of quality in free alternative software also helps to lower the use of copied software worldwide. Illegally copying software is seen by some software producers as a "lesser evil" than actually buying or illegally copying a competitor's software. Jeff Raikes, a Microsoft executive, stated that "If they're going to pirate somebody, we want it to be us rather than somebody else." He also added that "We understand that in the long run the fundamental asset is the installed base of people who are using our products. What you hope to do over time is convert them to licensing the software."

Traian Băsescu, the president of Romania, stated that "piracy helped the young generation discover computers. It set off the development of the IT industry in Romania."

Objections to the term "piracy"

Copyright Infringement has been called piracy since at least 1703. In the forward to Daniel Defoe's corrected edition of The True-Born Englishman, the author makes reference to "pirates and paragraph men" who distributed copies of his poem on the streets. Some modern groups object to the term "software piracy", however, believing that such a term unfairly equates copyright violators with murderers and thieves. Evidence of this can be seen in the Free Software Foundation's list of confusing words.

Impact on Workplaces

According to the journal published by Frederick Gallegos, they found that 90% of business employees believed that their colleagues copied software illegally. They also found that over 50% of managers indicated that they had committed software piracy. Males copied software illegally more frequently than females and younger students were more likely to pirate software than older students.