Romania Fights Software Piracy

According to the Business Software Alliance (BSA) recently published press release, Romanian authorities are investigating three major cases of unlicensed software use by large and mid-sized companies in Romania.

The companies mentioned in the press release possessed a total of EUR 196,000 (USD 264,227) worth of unlicensed software by major software producers, who are also BSA members. Two of the companies inspected, one from western and the other from eastern Romania, specialize in architecture, design and technical consultancy. They were found to be using EUR 130,000 (USD 175,252) and EUR 26,000 (USD 35,050) worth of unlicensed software respectively.

Additionally, a cluster of stationery companies is under investigation for using EUR 40,000 (USD 53,923) worth of unlicensed software.

In 2010, Romanian authorities carried out over 300 inspections confiscating more than 21,000 counterfeit software disks.

Even though most of the cases are still ongoing, the Romanian courts have pronounced a total of 28 verdicts in sofware copyright infringement cases in 2010. In October 2010, the Romanian Court of Appeal pronounced its first criminal sentence in a Torrent case. The owner of the Torrent website www.kartel.ro was sentenced to six months in prison and remuneration of damages to several rights owners. The website was closed down in 2007, but it has taken three years for the case to conclude.

The BSA is a nonprofit trade association representing some of the world’s leading software makers such as Adobe Systems, Apple Inc., Dell, IBM and Microsoft.

For more information, please contact Roxana Sarghi or Masa Lopicic.

Source: Business Software Alliance