domain-b: The value of pirated software was around $63.4 billion worldwide in 2011, rising from $59 billion in the prior year, according to an annual study from the Business Software Alliance (BSA) released yesterday. The study, conducted by IDC and Ipsos Public Affairs, comes as the US negotiates the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, a multilateral trade deal. The private sector hopes the deal would include tough IP enforcement provisions, a stance, which is supported by the study. According to the BSA-funded study, the rise in pirated software last year was due to the influx of personal computer shipments to developing economies that had high piracy rates. Around 56 per cent of new PCs were shipped to developing markets. In most emerging markets, there was no effective sheriff in town, according to computer users themselves, BSA CEO Robert Holleyman told Politico, an Arlington, Virginia-based American political journalism organisation in an interview. China with an illegal software market of $9 billion last year, continues to be a hub of software piracy boasting one of the highest piracy rates of the top 20 economies analysed in the study. The other so-called Bware RIC countries - Russia, India and Brazil came up behind China among the countries with the highest commercial value of pirated software last year. The big daddy of software piracy was, however, the US, where the commercial value of pirated software amounted to nearly $10 billion. However, according to the study, the US had the largest software market with the lowest piracy rate, at 19 per cent. The study found only 15 per cent of software pirates in emerging markets said the risk of getting caught would deter them while in developed markets, 20 per cent of software pirates replied in the same vein. The study said though, piracy rates in Mexico, India and Russia had improved slightly last year. According to Holleyman, software piracy did not just affect BSA's member companies - including Microsoft, Apple and Symantec, it also put ''mainstream'' US companies that paid for legal software at a disadvantage while competing against foreign companies that used pirated software. Holleyman said, the US government needed to squarely address China's growing software piracy problem. He said until China took steps that yielded measurable results in increased sales of legal software, then all of the other trade agreements together would have a smaller value than the value of correcting the huge imbalance that existed between the US and China. If 57 per cent of consumers admitted to shoplifting, authorities would react by increasing police patrols and penalties said Holleyman. He added, software piracy demanded a similarly forceful response – concerted public education and vigorous law enforcement. The BSA said many countries, including China, had not done enough to rein in rates of copyright infringement, and the organisation estimated that while approximately $3 billion worth of software was sold in China in 2011, another $9 billion worth was obtained illegally. According to Holleyman, if companies in high-piracy countries such as China were using the same software as those in the US but not paying for it, the Chinese businesses were getting an unfair advantage. Nations like Indonesia and Venezuela had higher piracy rates than China, but being smaller markets, the losses to the software industry are not as high.Source: domain-b.com
