Borland admits licensing mistake - News - Business

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This story was printed from ZDNet Australia.
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Borland admits licensing mistake

By Nicole Bellamy, ZDNet Australia
January 16, 2002
URL: http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/business/soa/Borland-admits-licensing-mistake/0,139023166,120262974,00.htm

Software vendor, Borland, has admitted to a licensing error which caused a furore among customers and privacy advocates alike.

Customers flocked to the Borland Web site earlier this week to voice complaints about an audit clause within a new product license agreement.

The agreement contains a clause that allows Borland to enter the premises of its customers for auditing purposes. According to the clause, "Borland, or its outside auditors, will have the right to enter your premises and access your records and computer systems to verify that your have paid to Borland the correct amounts owed under this License and determine whether the Products are being used in accordance with the terms of the License."

The clause was written into both enterprise-level and single-user licensing agreements.

End-users of Borland products submitted a barrage of letters and articles to the Borland community Web site, complaining about the clause and demanding explanations.

They were joined by privacy advocates from the IT developer community, who were concerned about the privacy ramifications of such a clause.

According to a statement by Borland CEO, Dale Fuller, this clause was inserted into the single-user licensing agreements in error.

"The new end user license agreement mistakenly contains language that is specific to enterprise volume customers. This language is industry standard boilerplate for enterprise licenses, but it should not have been included in the individual product licenses," stated Fuller.

Fuller has also committed to fixing the error.