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SCO Expands Licensing Money Chase Worldwide
drizst 'n drat writes "Article posted recently on ZDNet that 'companies outside the United States that use Linux now face the threat of legal action from the SCO Group, following the announcement on Wednesday that SCO's licenses are available worldwide.'" And cbiltcliffe writes "Vnunet is reporting that SCO is now threatening legal action against UK businesses that run Linux.
Yet again, they claim they're going to initiate legal action against Linux users 'within a couple of weeks.' (Funny...weren't they saying that back in September?)
They also claim that Novell and HP indemnification schemes are essentially useless (similar to SCO's Linux licences).
It definitely appears the media is getting somewhat wiser to the FUD, however, as the story reports 'The run-time licence only permits use of what SCO says is its IP,' rather than 'The licence permits use of SCO's IP' like we would have heard a couple of months ago."
Translation: "We have them our ultimatum, and they gave us the finger!"
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
In Scotland, Extortion (the obtaining of money or goods by means of illegitimate threats or demands) is a criminal offence. As a result, such practises as private firms clamping your car for parking on private property then demanding money to release it is illegal in Scotland but not in England. As a result, any Scottish company receiving one of these demands may wish to request a copy of the infringing source and if it's not forthcoming deem the request as an illegitimate threat and report SCO to the police.
In addition the new Proceeds of Crime Act gives police the power to seize all assets belonging to criminals participating in the practise of extortion. Such assets could include cars, houses, boats and bank accounts.
For those of you who don't know what barratry is (I had no idea until 2 minutes ago): Wikipedia's Barratry entry.
$60/month Colo'd Linux Sever
Damn right, first in the UK the loser pays the costs of both sides. SCO is a foreign corporation and could probably be required to put up a surety if they brought a claim.
Second and more interesting there is actually a tort in the UK that covers this exact type of case.
It is not a good idea to send out demand letters to a UK address unless you can substantiate the claim made.
The UK legal systen is not the place to start frivolous lawsuits unless you have no money to start with and so won't be worse off if you get made bankrupt.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
If the SCO stock keeps going down like it has the past 3 days, they will need to jump ship soon. Perhaps the rats are swimming already for paradise island.
Causing Chaos Everywhere,
Nik J.
The strange world of a loner, in a populous city, drowning in society
So if they can get inside of IBM records they can begin to stitch a winnable case together, while if the "Match code or acquit" theory holds then the case is over. So if they can satisfy the initial requests enough to make the judge open up IBM to their SCO discover, then they can begin to make the case.
/. or me for legal advice, you're going to get your money's worth)
What you're describing is known as a "fishing expedition", and is generally frowned upon when bringing a lawsuit. The judge in this case apparently understands this, which is why she decided that SCO has to show all of their cards first before the judge will decide on SCO's Motion to Compel Discovery.
In case you've forgotten, here are some of the questions that SCO must answer before they get a shot at IBM:
INTERROGATORY NO. 1: seeks specific identification of all alleged trade secrets and confidential or proprietary information that SCO alleges IBM misappropriated or misused. This information is requested by product, file and line of code.
This means that IBM wants SCO to show show which parts of Linux are deemed to be infringing, "by product, file and line of code". This is "The Code" that followers of the suit have been waiting for since at least March.
INTERROGATORY NO. 2: For each alleged trade secret and any confidential or proprietary information identified in response to Interrogatory No. 1, Interrogatory No. 2 seeks further identification of: (a) all persons who have or had rights to the same; (b) the nature and sources of SCO's rights in the same; and (c) efforts to maintain secrecy or confidentiality of the same.
This is IBM saying "For each item you identified in answer to the first question, we want to know who else can claim rights that information, the exact nature of any agreements between that entity and SCO, and what efforts were made on both parts to keep it a secret." (Novell, maybe?)
INTERROGATORY NO. 3: For each alleged trade secret and any confidential or proprietary information identified in response to Interrogatory No. 1, Interrogatory No. 3 seeks the identity of all persons to whom the same was disclosed and the details of such disclosure. In particular, this interrogatory seeks: (a) the date of disclosure; (b) the terms of disclosure; (c) the documents relating to disclosure; (d) all places where the trade secret and/or confidential or proprietary information may be found or accessed.
This is IBM saying "For each of the items you identified in answer to the first question, we want to know who all you've shown that information to, when you showed it to them, why you showed it to them, all documentation relating to that disclosure, and any place where that information can be found." Remember, SCO not only charges that SCO's IP got into Linux against their wishes, but that IBM did it. IBM wants to see SCO's evidence that is had to be IBM and couldn't be someone else.
As far as what SCO wants this case to be about, SCO has contradicted itself on so many occasions that it's impossible to say with any certainty what SCO is suing over. We've gone from Darl McBride saying, on several occasions, that there is "line-by-line" copying of UnixWare code into Linux. But somehow we've gotten to the point where they're trying to tell the court that they can't possibly find has been infringed until they get their response from IBM.
So if you will excuse me, I will continue to believe that SCO are stupid scum, because they've not shown any evidence to the contrary.
Jay (=
(I'm not a lawyer either; if you're coming to