Businesses targeted for software audits by the Business Software Alliance (BSA) often learn that the BSA typically extends the scope of its audit requests to more than just software products and often requests information regarding client access to server products....
Software auditors almost always try to find ways to maximize the number of allegedly infringing software "copies" at issue in an audit engagement. It is typical for the Business Software Alliance (BSA), the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA), and...
Negotiating a settlement with the Business Software Alliance ("BSA") to resolve a copyright infringement dispute over allegedly unlicensed software can be arduous and costly. The BSA typically demands a penalty based on some multiple of the MSRP of each product...
Software piracy audits conducted by the BSA and the SIIA threaten small and medium sized businesses. As the economy tightens, software publishers such as Microsoft, Adobe, and Autodesk hide behind software piracy enforcement groups to pursue customers accused of installing...
A variety of resolution frameworks are available to businesses involved in a software license dispute. An audit is the most common such framework and entails an analysis of the organization's network for software installations compared against its licenses. The types...
One of the most common mistakes I encounter in software audits is what I call the post-effective date software buying spree. The buying spree occurs in response to a letter from a publisher or publisher's attorneys requesting a self audit....
Without a contractual provision to the contrary, ambiguous terms in a software license will be construed against the software publisher. Provided that there are no other business factors that would make litigation unwise, an ambiguous license agreement is the situation...
Software copyright infringement litigation (sometimes called software anti-piracy claims) comes in an array of varieties. Frequently, it is functionally indistinguishable from disputes involving literary or audio-visual works and centers on claims that an infringer copied a copyright owner's work and...
The Business Software Alliance ("BSA"), and the Software & Information Industry Association ("SIIA") pursue copyright infringement claims on behalf of software publishers, such as Microsoft, Adobe, and Autodesk, among many others. Typically the BSA and SIIA send audit letters to...
The Business Software Alliance (BSA) is an organization that pursues copyright infringement claims on behalf of many software publishers against companies it accuses of violating its members' software license agreements. Because the cost of litigation in most cases outweighs the...