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US Navy Faces $600M Lawsuit For Allegedly Pirating 3D VR Software (hothardware.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from HotHardware: The U.S. Navy has been accused of pirating 3D software after first testing a software package offered by Germany company Bitmanagement Software GmbH. The company is suing the United States of America for nearly $600 million. HotHardware reports: "According to the court filing, Bitmanagement licensed its BS Contact Geo software for use on 38 Navy computers from 2011 to 2012. This limited rollout was 'for the purposes of testing, trial runs, and integration into Navy systems.' While this test period was underway, the Navy reportedly began negotiating to license the software for use on thousands of additional computers. However, even as the negotiations were ongoing, the Navy decided to go ahead and initiate its full-scale rollout without actually paying for the software. In total, the initial 38 computers allegedly swelled to 104,922 computers by October 2013. As of today, BS Contact GEO is claimed to be installed on 558,466 Navy computers, although 'likely this unauthorized copying has taken place on an even larger scale' according to the filing. As if the unauthorized installation of software onto hundreds of thousands of computers wasn't enough, Bitmanagement is alleging that the Navy during 2014 began disabling the Flexwrap software that is tasked with tracking the use of BS Contact Geo and helping to prevent it from being duplicated. When this software piracy was taking place, the retail price of a single BS Contact Geo license was $1067.76. With nearly 600,000 computers now in play, Bitmanagement is seeking a whopping $596,308,103 in damages. The lawsuit, which alleges willful copyright infringement was filed on July 15th."
Bitmanagement Software's headquarters mysteriously exploded today.
Given that the maximum penalty for copyright infringement in the US is $150,000 per instance, the Navy is about to be fined $83.7 trillion!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
http://www.bitmanagement.com/p...
Looks like a google earth/GIS type application for loading terrain and city data. It's not a stereo head tracked 360 "VR" application.
The US Army pirated this program en masse and drove the company that produced it into bankruptcy. This is the origin of the "USG Restricted Rights" you see in license agreements - it came about from the Harvard Graphics lawsuit against the USG (which they won for a staggering amount of money).
wikipedia suggests that the US Navy only has 329,647 active duty personnel. I find it highly unlikely that every last one of their machines and some extra are being used for 3D VR.
$1067.76 per copy sounds a bit low compared to the typical damages per copied mp3. I'm sure they will come to an arrangement, but it would be fun if using is ok as long as you have the intention to eventually pay for it. maybe.
I didn't know you could 3-D print an entire battleship.
Why on earth would they want thousands? Much less hundreds of thousands.
Too bad it wasn't a software patent. Those deserve to be challenged by someone with deep pockets.
So the navy will have one less warplane this year.... In other news....
Because American companies don't mind you pirating their software?
I've heard of numerous cases where a subcontractor will be hit with a patent infringement suit, only to have a notice from some TLA with the word "National Security" scribbled on it and the case goes away. (Presumably the justification is that the case would jeopardize a program, project, or case vital to national security)
There isn't any reason they could not do the same thing for software. They won't, as that would make it difficult to secure vendors that usually enjoy being paid, but I imagine the military can get away with whatever they want and negotiate fees later. - Point is this company isn't going to strong arm the Navy with limp BSA extortion style shenanigans.
tracking the use of BS Contact Geo
Maybe military computers should license only special versions lacking this kind of thing in any software that otherwise sends usage reports back to the software vendor. That just might be a security risk.
Based on what someone told me many years ago, this isn't the first time they've rolled out software they had a limited license to en masse.
Well, shit. Do you guys take American Express?
Our card number is 3000-0000-0000-0001, expires 10/1971, zip is 20006.
The CVV is 000.
Flexwrap software blocked due to non us IP and there is no DMCA in the navy TS. PS we can send in navy seals can you?
US Navy is forced to pay the full amount, and shortly thereafter somehow (as another poster mentioned) the BS Contact's HQ exploded because of an "accident" during a live drill.
In a us court what about an German one?
Germany will learn the US Navy is just as shady China.
600,000 computers? How big do they think the U.S. Navy is anyway? That's almost two computers for every active duty service member. That's over 2,000 computers per ship. I'm not saying the Navy didn't steal their software, I have no clue about that. I'm just saying that 600,000 installs is A LOT for such an obscure piece of software.
Proverbs 21:19
They already did:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
So the armed forces should only have access to 2nd best products ?
arf arf. But seriously, almost 600,000 copies of a piece of software when the Department of the Navy has fewer official user workstations than that...much fewer. That's Army level of personnel, not Navy.
Then, there's some data online about the system in question. Seems like it's a system to support infrastructure for Navy bases and such. Seems like Northrop Grumman is involved, as well as some smaller contractors. Like this one, Synergy Software Design, with the terrible web site. Also appears that Synergy is the sole vendor and technical support provider for Bitmanagement Software GmbH in the US.
The conclusion I come to is that Synergy fucked over Bitmanagement somehow, and the Navy is being held in.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
3D VR software pirates you!
This makes me ask: Has the US navy started flying the pirate flag now?
More relevant to this case is Vickers and Krupp where the British from Vickers owed the German from Krupp a royalty for the shells Vickers sold to the British government for shelling the Germans.
After the war, at The Anglo-German mixed Arbitral Tribunal, Krupp demanded over £300,000 in unpaid royalties between 4th August 1914 and 30th September 1917 plus the interest for the whole non-payment period (1914 to 1926). Despite complaints from a variety of Government institutions about the case not coming to a conclusion, Vickers’ communications were slack. They usually answered, ‘we are consulting our solicitors.’ Their argument was that the Vickers-Krupp contracts specifically stipulated their German nature and therefore the validity of its cancellation during the war. Vickers also insisted it was the government’s responsibility to pay the post-war debts. Government lawyers estimated that should the Germans win the Tribunal case, the Treasury would be liable for half a million pounds sterling, of which Vickers would only contribute £180,000.
After years of legal wrangling, in 1926, Vickers were allowed to negotiate debts directly with Krupp and agreed to pay through the British and German Clearing Offices. On 1st September 1926 Vickers paid £40,000. It seems to be quite a modest estimation of the number of shells made and fired. However, at the same time, Vickers informed the British Government they were purchasing British rights of a Clock Fuze and other patents from Krupp, which must have sweetened the blow.
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Bang ding ou, bang ding ou ... hore fuk hore fuk!
Ha ha
Oh, you are one of those.... sorry, I mistook you for someone who would actually contribute to a conversation.
on one hand I support piracy and every violation of copyright law and will until the law is reformed. ...
What do you have against Linux and the GPL?
Without strong copyright laws, you could pirate GPL software too.
lol, with the amount of crap the Germans steal from us...
Keep telling yourself that. You can put it on your CV when you are old enough to get a job;-
* Corrects grammar in internet discussions.
They will give you a medal or something for your important work.
Probably scaled so quickly because it was being deployed on hundreds of thousands of virtual machines. It's the only reason I can think of for such fast deployment and over abundance of installations. Funny thing is it got to that many installs before they realized every install was being tracked and billed even on VM's. Billing cost went through the roof and IT was told to do something about it. Rip out tracking on a system that's deployed on hundreds of thousands of servers, pay the bill, or start fresh with different solution. Lawsuit shows what option Navy chose. Someone up high in the Navy is gonna lose a stripe for this.
The government should be required to only use open source software.
"...these sorts of stupid mistakes.." rather than "this sort of stupid mistakes". This and sort refer to the singular, while mistakes is plural.
I understand that this is about the Navy who is actually capable of piracy.
Reading further however makes it clear that it's just another case of copyright infringement.
Piracy is, in fact, an act of robbery or criminal violence at sea.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy...
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/...
why not not i'd download a car!
now the US navy can arrest pirates without having to ever put out to sea.
Avast, we be no pirates. Make the lubbers walk the plank!
Not an unreasonable answer. And immoral one, perhaps, but not unreasonable. You can't sue the US govt. in a US court unless it agrees to allow you to do so.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
"It's better to be a pirate, than join the Navy."
And now we can do both!
People frequently pirate GPL software. When discovered the demanded payment is usually opening of the source code.
I will grant that without copyright laws the GPL would be more like the BSD or MIT licenses. I wouldn't find that horrible...if there weren't any copyright laws. As it is, I prefer the GPL to ensure that the works written won't be copyrighted and claimed against the original authors.
Another part of the problem is patent laws. The GPL2 wouldn't have any teeth without copyright laws, but the GPL3 attempts to ensure that patents also cannot be used to unreasonably attack GPL3 derivative works. Given patent laws I'm not sanguine about how well this would work, but it's an attempt.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
If the military needs property, it can simply take it and pay for it later. They can apply for payment of the actual value of what was taken, but not punitive damages, attorney fees, etc. General Groves did not buy land from farmers for the Manhattan Project. Rather, he just moved people off, and they got paid something later, if they applied.
Am I the only one who sees the Irony "US Navy accused of Piracy"
Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.
Late last century, the US govt stole the very versatile and useful PROMIS from it's developers, decided that they would bankrupt and destroy the company rather than paying the contracted fees.
What's to keep a similar thing from happening here?