Microsoft Pursues Business Pirates

Microsoft is fed up and isn't going to take it anymore! After warning in mid-2011 that it would pursue users of pirated software programs, the Seattle (Wash.) based software giant has filed a series of civil and penal actions against local businesses.

Software piracy here is rampant and estimates range from 60% to 75% of the programs in use in this country are unlicensed. A company press release says that Microsoft has filed 10 extra-judicial conciliatory actions against computer assemblers here as well as seven suits against companies.

Just in January alone, Microsoft filled two suits against companies using 225 computers that contain allegedly pirated programs for a loss to Microsoft of some 64 million colones in license fees.

The software giant says that companies accused must pay 87 million colones in indemnities. The company had warned that it was "redoubling its efforts" to protect itself and cautioned "don't run the risk."

The consulting firm IDC estimates that 58% of the software in use in this country is unlicensed, less than average for Latin American countries but higher than the world figure. It represents a $55 million loss annually.

Microsoft's Latin American director intellectual property Miguel Sciancalepore told the Spanish-language newspaper La Nacion last week that Microsoft was targeting companies using unlicensed software and not private users.

But, the Microsoft lawyer says, domestic users pay in their own way and most often innocently. They buy a computer and, if it starts to malfunction, will call a service center only to find out then that the programs it contains are knockoffs.

The programs are often obsolete and prone to viruses. Moreover, the loss is that of the government as well, since it implies a loss of tax revenue and lower employment.

Monserrat Duran of the Business Software Alliance, a non-profit group of software producers, agrees that the biggest offenders are companies. "There are companies that buy one software license and (program) 20 computers with this same license," she says.

She, too, feels that most private users are victims, not pirates. "A family makes the effort to buy their child a computer," she says, "paying as if all were legal and only later finds out it wasn't. It's a ripoff."

Commentary: It's not only the computer assembly people and company technicians who steal from software manufacturers. This reporter recently invited a techie to his home to install a new anti-virus program.

After the techie was gone, a pop-up informed him that the program was illegal. In fact, it was probably older than the obsolete one it replaced, therefore more vulnerable. Rats!