The Business Software Association of Australia (BSAA) has launched a new campaign to combat software piracy in Australia, arguing that the problem is costing the country over $1 billion a year.
The BSAA is an industry-funded body working towards the reduction in software piracy. Over recent months the Association has launched a number of high profile legal actions over illegal software against companies such as Magna Data, Prestige Colour and BMW Australia.
Under the current campaign the Association is offering businesses and individuals who suspect they may have illegal copies of software a grace period until June 30 so that they can come forward and receive help to get licensed copies of software.
The BSAA estimates that around 32 per cent of all software in Australia is illegal, a figure that BSAA Chair Jim Macnamara said is far too high.
"This compares to 27 per cent in the US and even the US figure is regarded as unacceptably high," he noted.
In order to reduce the amount of piracy the BSAA has launched a new advertising campaign offering rewards of $5,000 to persons reporting incidences of piracy. The advertising also points out that software piracy is a breach of the Copyright Act carry and can result in prison terms or fines of up to $302,500.
While considerable media attention is focused on software counterfeiters and illegal imports, Macnamara pointed out that most illegal software is simply organisations installing too many copies of software packages on their computers.
"A very large part of illegal software out there is simply individuals of businesses operating in excess of their licence conditions."
Another focus of the BSAA campaign is drawing attention to the negative effect that software piracy has on the Australian economy.According to estimates from PriceWaterhouseCoopers, if software piracy was reduced by 5 per cent by the year 2001, around $1 billion in revenue and 7000 jobs would be created.
"We're making the point to the government that it's a problem for the economy, not just the industry. We have a major economic loss in the country because of software piracy.'
Macnamara said that they plan on educated as much of the market as possible, however when all else fails, they still plan on launching more litigation to ensure that business gets the picture.
"We don't go out there into the market and just litigate, we've put an enormous amount of work into education, but if this doesn't get through to businesses we cannot accept the piracy levels we have and we are increasing the level of litigation."
