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Get up to $50,000 for qualifying illegal, counterfeit, or under-licensed software piracy reports!

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Well, it looks like software piracy may pay after all! Only this time, it pays (up to $50,000!) for those who help address the issue by reporting it either via the Business Software Alliance hotline (1-888-NO PIRACY) or online reporting form before midnight (PST) on Tuesday, February 28, 2006.. That’s right, you can receive up to $50,000 for providing qualified lead reports to the Business Software Alliance to help identify and address illegal software. Why is this up to $50,000 offer being made? Simple, according to Jenny Blank, director of enforcement for BSA. "BSA hopes that its rewards program will provide people with the encouragement they need to do the right thing and report software piracy in their current or former workplace confidentially."

Can BSA have an impact? Online, you can see six different companies the BSA has announced fines totaling $932,500 against since last week alone! This new $50,000 offer is designed to help provide even more leads for the BSA to follow-up on than they already have so they can have an even larger impact to help protect legal software users and resellers from the problem illegal software presents.

So, if your company is running illegal or mis-licensed software, or if you are selling or distributing illegal or mis-licensed software, realize that you now have bounty sticker worth up to $50,000 placed on your back and you are one phone call or email from someone around you collecting on that bounty. And if that happens, you can become a test case for the theory that all press is good press, just like the six companies listed on the BSA site this past week as part of the just under $1 MILLION DOLLARS in fines levied during this time.

If you know of someone running illegal or mis-licensed software (yes, this includes not having enough licenses, or maybe they are running Office Student & Teacher Edition in a business, etc.) and you want to get your shot at a reward of up to $50,000, submit your report to the BSA directly either:

- By phone: 1-888-NO-PIRACY
- Online submission form: https://reporting.bsa.org/usa/

If you know of someone selling or distributing illegal or counterfeit software and you want to get your shot at a reward of up to $50,000, submit your report to the BSA directly either:

- By phone: 1-888-NO-PIRACY
- Online submission form: https://reporting.bsa.org/usa/

If you are running illegal or mis-licensed software in your company or are not quite sure if you are or not, the BSA does provide some resources and tools on their site for you to use to help determine this: https://www.bsa.org/usa/antipiracy/Tools-Resources.cfm. You can also utilize several of the items Microsoft makes available on our piracy site: https://www.microsoft.com/piracy. Partners, be sure to also check out the Software Asset Management Partner Training site for Software Asset Management information and tools.

Thank you and have a wonderful day,

Eric Ligman
Microsoft US Senior Manager
Small Business Community Engagement
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights

Comments

  • Anonymous
    February 10, 2006
    Based on the earlier post we did about the $50,000 reward the Business Software Alliance is currently...
  • Anonymous
    March 06, 2006

    Last month I posted about the Business Software Alliance offering up to $50,000 in rewards for qualifying...