I'd like someone to clarify something. It is my understanding that these statistics on "losses" are generated by guesstimating how many pirated versions are on computer systems, multiplying the wholesale value of said pirated software with these guesstimated numbers which generates a number that is supposed to generate a "Holy $%!+" response from people. After all, four billion is an enormous number. Are we supposed to believe that the Chinese, Ukrainians, Vietnamese et. al would actually lay down cash money for software? Are they generating a "loss" from money that doesn't even exist? I hate these "woe is us" articles from the likes of the BSA. "Neotheft" (I just coined that phrase... nifty!), or theft of consumer replicable items (such as CDs, DVDs, computer software) can't be pegged down like one could peg the actual loss of revenue from physical, non-replicable items like cars, televisions and museum art. What I am saying is that these stats are absolutely BOGUS because they are using the traditional theft/loss equation on an item that cannot be accurately plugged in to that model. APf
Yes, exactly. Just like the RIAA and their alleged "losses" due to file sharing.
There's a lot of different ways to identify pirated software. One of the big ones is tech support, you'd be suprised how many people using pirated software will actually contact tech support if they have a problem, then depending on the distribution model you either find out really quick. Or if tech support is unable to solve the problem they'll frequently offer to refund the money if the person will send in the media, when you get a bunch dead air after making that offer it's assumed to be pirated. If the software touches the internet at all there are various ways to detect if it's pirated. For desktop publishing it can be pretty easy to, if some company publishes their manual in PDF but Adobe has no record of that company ever purchasing the Acrobat Publisher then they assume it's pirated (don't know if there's a 3rd party app that can make PDFs, but for purposes of these kind of stats the company always pretends there isn't).
In a free flowing information age finding out if somebody has software they didn't pay for just gets easier, doing something about it though is another matter.