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Shakedown: How the Business Software Alliance Operates
An anonymous source writes: "I'm a faculty member at a public university which the
Business Software Alliance contacted in a bulk mailing last Fall. Stupidly, our IT department invited them in to 'explain' licensing to us, and now we are trying to fend off an audit on our computers (public and private). Two questions: what kind of leverage does the BSA actually have against us? And does anyone have war stories, successful or otherwise, of their encounters with the BSA?" Although Slashdot is running this story as from an anonymous reader, we have contacted the source and believe the story is factual and the appeal for help is real. Consider this Slashdot's contribution to National Copyright Awareness Week.
The source continues: "The report that the BSA gave to our administration was filled with scary stories about other schools who tried to resist, so unless there's some hard evidence to the contrary I suspect our university will just roll over. We were told that:
- auditing software *will* be installed on every campus machine;
- the license for every program, on every machine, must be produced upon demand;
- failure to produce licenses for all commercial or shareware software will constitute prima facie evidence of illegal possession, with penalties that could range from the confiscation of the machine to the firing of the user;
- and this includes computers *personally* owned by faculty."
I would suggest that you 'lawyer up'.
You absolutely need your legal counsel involved in this. An IT department is generally unsuited to handle these type of business/legal affairs.
By sucking in the legal folks you turn it from an IT problem to a 'university as a whole' problem.
Do not let them strong arm you into anything. Play hardball. Tell them you are doing an internal review that could take months.
Remember, they will be very reluctant to force the issue into a courtroom. It is very bad PR for them to take an impoverished college to court. A jury would be filled with people who all have 'unlicensed' software on their home PCs.
But in the end, you will have to make a reasonable effort to be in compliance and generally pay for the software you use. That, my friend, will be unavoidable. Unless, you switch IT platforms to a free or close-to-free software environment.
Good luck.
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While the idea of a campus that's totally open source is cute, the idea is totally unworkable and not a feasible solution. That is the reason noone will respond this way. People spend money on software because some software is only legally available when you spend money. If I was still in high school, it would be a no-brainer to decide not to go to any school that didn't use any proprietary software.
We'd all like free software. However, with very rare exceptions, the best (or all) software in most domains is closed. Why? Because I can't find enough chemistry people and programmers who will cooperate to make me specialized software of superb quality unless I unload a big pile of cash.
There's a name for this and it's called extortion. Here's how it works. I am the extorter and you are the extortee. I come up to you and say, "A little birdie told me that you are/have performed xxx criminal act. If you don't pay me off, I'll tattle on you." Note: Even if even you do pay me, you still have committed a criminal offense. Paying the extorter cannot change that. If they have legitimate knowledge that you are committing a criminal offense, taking hush money is a crime.
The BSA uses the same tactics. They allege that if you don't comply, you'll be busted. However, they're not acting on behalf of the government. In fact, with only the evidence of "I got an anonymous tip," they shouldn't be able to get a Judge to sign off on a search warrant. After all, for them to get a search warrent, the cops need to have probable cause. I don't see how a third party, who has an anonymous tip from some other third party is probable (it's heresay). Without a search warrant, there's no phyiscal evidence of criminal conduct.
In short, consult your legal professional. Don't forget that you can sue them, too.
Caveat: IANAL.
As far as I know, they have no grounds to force you to do ANYTHING unless you have signed a bulk-license or site-license agreement. Those agreements generally give you access to the software for a lot less money, but in return you give up all protection against 'unreasonable search' -- part of the agreement you sign allows them to inspect your systems to make sure you are in compliance.
If you bought your software through normal distribution channels, chances are very good you can tell them to pike off. As far as I know, a click-wrap license DOES NOT allow a search, because they can't know whether you agreed to the license without searching you first. It's only when you signed another agreement, which they have on file, that they have you over a barrel.
I will add my voice to the many others here telling you to get the lawyers involved. The BSA plays serious hardball. These people survive and can continue to exist only by extracting large sums of cash from your organization, and will use any tactic required.
They are not your friends. They are active enemies and you should treat them as such.
(* This is who the BSA *really* is: [big software companies] *)
Try this: Tell them you will go on a mad OSS campaign if they don't go away. Show them a proposal to spend X amount of money on OSS advertising and promotion around the campus and elsewhere.
Show them a draft of an article about BSA thuggery and why it is now time for OSS that you plan to publish.
When they send in a representative, have a bunch of Penguins, OSS posters, and Red Hat boxes around your office. Give them a free Penguin T-shirt on their way out.
Table-ized A.I.