Sony BMG Sued For Using Pirated Software

An anonymous reader sends us to ZeroPaid, which seems to be the only site in English to have picked up a story out of France involving Sony and piracy. Except this time the shoe is on the other foot. The small software company PointDev learned that Sony BMG was using a pirated license for one of its system administration tools. PointDev got bailiffs to raid a Sony property and they found pirated software on four servers. The source article (link is to a Google translation of French original) quotes PointDev's spokesman claiming that the BSA believes 47% of software used in corporations to be illegal — whether he is referring to Sony in particular is not clear in the translation.

Inside Sony

[Anonymous Coward]

I work in one of the US divisions of Sony as a system administrator. I know for a fact that all the commercial software I have knowledge of is properly licensed. This could be a rogue admin who couldn't be bothered to go through the proper channels for a license. Alternatively, it could be a problem with that particular division. It is NOT a company wide problem.

47% is global, not for Sony

[sodul]

PointDev's spokesman claiming that the BSA believes 47% of software used in corporations to be illegal -- whether he is referring to Sony in particular is not clear in the translation.

I'm french so I can provide a more accurate translation:

Selon la Business Software Alliance, une association regroupant les principaux éditeurs du marché, 47 % des programmes utilisés en entreprise le seraient de manière illégale en France...

According to the Business Software Alliance, an organization representing the major software companies, 47% of the software used by businesses in France is used illegally.

So 47% is the global number for french businesses, not limited to Sony.

Bad summary

[nonpareility]

Not that I expect Slashdot editors to be able read French, but if you're going to post a story on a top news site, it's usually a good idea to know what it says. -Specifically, it's PointDev's CEO quoted in the article, not just some spokesman. -PointDev's CEO is not claiming the BSA said anything. The article states BSA's statistics. -BSA's statistics clearly refer to enterprises in general. How would anyone (besides Sony) know the exact percentage of software that's pirated in Sony?

The 47% figure

[psychodelicacy]

I think the original French article is saying that 47% of software used in companies in France (rather than just by Sony) is being used illegally. And it's quoting the Business Software Alliance directly, not the PointDev spokesman.

I still wonder...

[Mantaar]

why the fuck stupid Microsoft didn't get busted for something similar [slashdot.org].

It's good to see Sony pay though. I hope this gets mainstream news coverage - I really can't stand those Hippocr... ah, excuse me, my choleric side is breaking through again...

Sue the bastards!

Re:47% is global, not for Sony

[MikeCamel]

Seconded: the Google translation is poor, and the original French is clear. It's not talking about 47% of software used by Sony, but by enterprises in France.

If you steal software, don't call the support

[af48]

"PointDev aurait remarqué que Sony BMG ne disposait pas des droits d'Ideal Migration, après une demande d'aide envoyée par l'un des employés de la maison de disques au support technique."

"PointDev noticed that Sony was unlawfully using "Ideal Migration" only after receiving support inquiries from one of Sony's employees."

Re:Why it does not happen more often?

[tomhudson]

It would only take one of these people to become disgruntled and rat out their employer

And this seems to be exactly what happened. For those who don't follow links:

An investigation triggered by the request of an employee of Sony BMG

Nope. I read the original french article, not the translation, and the employee called tech support for help, not knowing that the license key was pirated. PointDev didn't have them in their customer database, tracked down the key, then got a bailiff to seize the servers in question.

Re:Awesome...

[tomhudson]

Riiiiiight. Because this isn't OBVIOUSLY the actions of a single (or small group of) admin(s), in COMPLETE violation of formal, written company policy...

I don't know what the "translation" says, but the original french article makes the point that the keys were generated at the time of the merger of the 2 companies, when they would need to migrate data from one server to another. It wasn't "casual". that's why the company is saying they're not interested in "working out a settlement" - they want a judgment, to serve as a warning.

Re:Inside Sony

[faedle]

I was going to come in here and make this exact comment.

I can count on one finger the organizations I've worked for where shareware tools like WinZip were actually properly licensed. At one shop I worked at, I actually had the CFO (who also functioned as the CIO/CTO) say, in these exact words, "oh, nobody actually enforces that WinZip license.. you think the BSA is gonna come in here and bust our nuts over 100 unlicensed copies of WinZip? Get real!".

Three months after I left this company, the BSA came in, did a "software audit", and indeed busted their nuts over 100 unlicensed copies of WinZip (along with other licensing violations).

Re:Not surprising

[tomhudson]

The weird part was that it was http://www.laprovence.com/articles/2008/03/19/347901-UNKNOWN-Une-societe-vauclusienne-attaque-le-geant-Sony.php [laprovence.com] rather obvious it was cracked - there was a keygen used (search the net for "TAM/CORE" for more info) and most of the time, people who install cracked software leave the keygen somewhere on the machine "just in case".

This is one of the risks that you run into when your business is dependent on closed-source, proprietary software - more specifically, in this case, when you run Windows.

Re:Inside Sony

[perlchild]

Oddly enough, you're asking them about software they don't know about...
Well if they don't know about it, how do you expect them to answer?

Or do you just expect them to check now, and give you an answer later?
As for reflecting on them... Employee behaviour at one sibling company doesn't reflect on the other sibling company, it reflect on the parent, for not disciplining it's "child" companies. This is not just a division, they are seperate companies, with only some owners in common.

47% of *French* companies

[radagenais]

The French article states that 47% of French (as in, in France) companies run pirated software. ('entreprises' is more generic in French; so this implies small/medium/big biz) They don't quote the source of their statistic.

Re:Let me be the first to say

[digitig]

All I ask is a little consistency....

Why? /. is not one single person, nor is it one single person's view. There are lots of us in here, and some of us disagree with some of the others. You think that's hypocrisy? I think you don't understand what /. is.

Re:Inside Sony

[analog_line]

Well if they don't know about it, how do you expect them to answer?

Legally, they're required to know about everything, even the stuff they don't know about. If they don't know about someone installing an illicit copy of MS Office on their work laptop, and that person is caught, they're certainly likely to fire the employee, but that doesn't stop them from being liable. Ask all the companies that the BSA's raided over the years.

Re:Let me be the first to say

[Immortal Poet]

There is underway currently the greatest transfer of wealth in human history, and it's going from workers to the very rich. Sort of socialism in reverse, and the result will be that the world will become a very unpleasant place in which to live for most of us.

got any facts to back up that claim, or are you just another pie in the sky left wing hippie running their mouth off between bongs?

I believe that PopeRatzo is talking about the fact that the richest 10% of the world population controls 85% of the world's wealth, and the poorest 50% of the world population controls only 1% of the world wealth. Over the past decade, these numbers have become more and more disparate, with the wealthiest controlling more and more wealth, and the poorest controlling less and less. You will be able to find out more by reading a helpful power point presentation [scribd.com] of a study conducted by the World Institute for Development Economics Research of the United Nations University. Do these facts sufficiently back up that claim?

Re:Inside Sony

[mabhatter654]

but what about EVERY backup copy on EVERY server and PC desktop.... even the BROKEN or workbench ones? That's how they get you.

Software licensing is like that statement "give me 6 lines from an honest man...", The one-sided structure of most EULA's makes them nearly impossible to be 100% legal in the real world.

Let's say you have a backup server cluster/SAN.. technically that software may be considered "pirated" because it's on the PC running it, and 2 backup servers that "could" run it, as well as any PC connected to the network drive. They would count your licensed backup as the one to tape... if they don't get you for "distributing" those tapes to your various backup locations. Take the case of Earnie Ball where they moved PCs from Engineers to Secretaries without properly removing ALL the software (fonts and custom drivers count too!) first (the only safe way is wipe and re-install, uninstallers don't work properly for LEGAL purposes!! ha, ha). When you replace a user's PC for a new one you take away the old one while you build the new one, right.. and make them wait a day so the licenses are "legal". you get the idea...