Piracy tip-offs treble - News - Security

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This story was printed from ZDNet Australia.
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Piracy tip-offs treble

By Mark Street, IT Week
January 15, 2001
URL: http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/security/soa/Piracy-tip-offs-treble/0,130061744,120108147,00.htm

A trebling in the number of tip-offs relating to the use of illegal software has prompted the British Software Alliance (BSA) to extend until mid-February its high-profile advertising campaign offering cash rewards.

The increase follows the launch of the BSA's business-oriented advertising drive last autumn, originally scheduled to run until the end of December, offering a cash reward of Â£10,000 for information leading to successful prosecutions. The campaign also highlighted the fact that company directors are held personally responsible for software piracy within their firms, with the threat of unlimited fines and prison sentences of up to two years.

The number of reports of software theft for November was three times the monthly average, according to figures just released by the alliance, despite the fact that the proportion of pirated software has been falling. The activity saw 11,000 visitors access the BSA Web site, while more than 1,300 people contacted the BSA confidential hotline.

The number of firms trying to put their software in order also rose -Â 829 used the Web site to download Gasp, a free self-auditing tool, while 921 people downloaded a guide to software management.

Mike Newton, campaign manager for BSA UK, said, "We are glad that people are using the BSA for assistance and advice, and hope that we are one step further to stamping out software piracy."

More than a quarter of computer software programmes used in the UK in 1999 were illegal copies, according to research conducted by the BSA. The alliance's members include Microsoft and Adobe.