Companies are sometimes fielding multiple software audit demands from multiple software vendors simultaneously, which can significantly impact in-house counsel. Software audits may be initiated by publishers or through outside entities such as BSA | The Software Alliance. Audits initiated directly from a software publisher are sometimes presented as a sales offer from the compliance team,…
How to Protect Your Company Against Copyright Infringement Claims by Disgruntled Employees Seeking a Reward In an effort to enforce the copyrights of its members, Business | The Software Alliance (“BSA”) offers the potential for monetary rewards to any informant that shares information related to software copyright infringement against a company. Many of our clients…
The BSA | The Software Alliance (“the BSA”) investigates claims of software copyright infringement behalf of its member software publishers to determine whether any companies end users have unlicensed software installed in violation of The Copyright Act. The BSA has been granted a power of attorney to pursue claims relating to copyright infringement on behalf…
Software publishers, acting alone, or through a proxy such as the Business Software Alliance (“BSA”) or Software & Information Industry Association (“SIIA”), regularly audit customers or potential customers to ensure license compliance and deter against copyright infringement. For mid-sized or larger companies that employ an in-house or external IT resource to manage software purchases and…
BSA| The Software Alliance (“BSA”) is an organization that investigates copyright infringement claims on behalf of software publishers such as Adobe, Autodesk, Microsoft, CNC, and Parametric Technology Corporation. The process for software audits can be tricky, time consuming, and confusing. The BSA has a very specific process that audit targets are expected to follow. Following…
Most software audits initiated by the software publisher or a third party entity authorized to pursue copyright infringement claims on behalf of the software publishers, such as the BSA| The Software Alliance (“BSA”) or the Software & Industry Information Association (“SIIA”), are resolved outside of a courtroom. Many of the settlements require payment of a…
Recent trends indicate that software publishers are increasingly initiating direct software audits instead of outsourcing the auditing process to entities such as the BSA | The Software Alliance (“BSA”) or Software & Information Industry Association (“SIIA”). However, the BSA and SIIA continue to actively target companies of all sizes to determine whether the company is…
Sometimes a company receives notices of audits from many publishers or trade associations at the same time. Often this is because multiple agencies have received confidential reports from the same informant. If a current or previous employee contacts both the Software & Information Industry Association (“SIIA”) and BSA|The Software Alliance (“BSA”), the company may face…
The Business Software Alliance (BSA) regularly targets small-to-medium sized businesses for expensive software audits to determine whether those businesses are in compliance with their BSA-member software licenses. In furtherance of that effort, the BSA offers cash rewards to disgruntled current or former employees who provide information about allegedly unlicensed software installed on their employers’ computers….
The Business Software Alliance (BSA) hunts down and audits companies when it receives information that those companies may have software products that are not properly licensed. If a company audited by the BSA is found to have more installations of software products than is reflected in its licensing documentation, it is generally more cost effective…
