(NAPSA)—Is breaking the law ever acceptable behavior? Does it depend on who is committing the crime or should everyone be treated equally under the law? According to research conducted by International Data Corporation (IDC) in 2004, information technology (IT) professionals believe that the illegal copying of software by an individual for a friend is a harmless infraction and that the same activity at a small business could be tolerated due to a lack of resources. However, the same research from the “Global Software Piracy Study” shows that IT professionals felt that inappropriate use of software at large companies is unethical and illegal. This dichotomy in attitudes is a major contributing factor to the software piracy problem. Today, 22 percent of the software in the U.S. is pirated, according to the Business Software Alliance (BSA), the organization representing the leading software developers. Attitudes Toward Software Piracy The research measured IT professionals’ attitudes toward softwarepiracy and found that most IT professionals admitted that their organization is either currently out of compliance or has been out of compliance at some point in the recent past. However, they do not consider themselves to be committing a crime but rather theyfeel they are victims of circumstances that makeit difficult to get compliant. They feel that they have “fallen” out of compliance for a variety of reasons including complacency, lack of rigorous procedures andfailure to get senior management and business decision makers to take the problem seriously and to allocate funds to bring the company into compliance. Knowing The Consequences ChangesBehavior Establishing software managementpolicies that protect comput- While 22 percent of the software in the U.S. is pirated, there are waysto protect yourself and your company. ers from unlicensed software and educating employees about these policies will help mitigate the risks of software piracy. Knowing that companies are paying significant fines for software piracy is causing IT professionals and senior managementto take notice. There are also serious technological and security risks associated with unlicensed software use. Autodesk, Inc., a founding mem- ber of BSA and one of the largest software companies in the world, aggressively pursues organiza- tions that illegally copy its design software. With six million users, Autodesk is the world’s leading software and services company for the building, manufacturing, infrastructure, digital media and wireless data servicesfields. “We find that small and medium-sized companies that lack formal procedures and resources are the biggest culprits,” said Sandy Boulton, director of Piracy Prevention at Autodesk. “But size is no excuse. Paying for software is one of the costs of doing business. We have free resources and toolkits at our Web site to assist companies with instituting formal software managementpolicies.” To learn more about software piracy prevention, find helpful resources or report suspected Autodesk piracy confidentially, contact www.autodesk.com/piracy or 1-800-NO COPIES.
