The Business Software Alliance (BSA) has filed a claim of more than R4 million against Boston City Campus, a tertiary training institution.
The BSA claims Boston is guilty of systematic piracy of software by, among others, Microsoft, Lotus and Adobe, and alleges that the institution routinely installed illegal software from a limited number of licensed packages.
BSA chairman Mark Reynolds says the piracy was "blatant" and "extensive", and spread over a wide number of sites.
Boston City Campus says it is the victim of an over-eager watchdog.
"We approached the BSA more than a year ago, because we were concerned about the proliferation of software among our students," says Boston director Ari Katz. "We asked for advice on how to curb this."
Katz adds that consultants called in yesterday, after the BSA summons was served, confirmed that the organisation is now "100% legal". "We have an open door policy," he says. "The BSA is welcome to come and inspect our premises."
Reynolds says it makes little difference who was responsible for the copyright infringement, and that the current state of affairs has little to do with the claim.
"The owner of the [computers] is responsible for the software installed on them. We haven`t been on the premises, and they might now have licensed software, but that doesn`t change the previous non-compliance."
According to Reynolds, the alleged piracy was reported via the BSA piracy tip-off line more than 18 months ago.
Katz would not comment on the legal state of the claim, but indicated that Boston would defend the matter.
Boston City Campus forms part of a group which includes the Boston Technology Campus and Ambassador Training, which offers the Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer and Software Developer courses, among others. Reynolds, also Microsoft`s anti-piracy manager, says it is unlikely that the software claim will affect the certification of the training companies.
"From a Microsoft point of view, this would not necessarily mean anything about our relationship with these training companies. These are separate issues." Boston City Campus was not a Microsoft registered training institution at the time of the non-compliance.
This latest BSA action brings the value of computer piracy claims this year to more than R8 million, with R3.7 million worth of PCs seized in Mpumalanga early last week. The PCs were allegedly fraudulent copies of the Xylo brand, and are said to have contained illegally copied software.
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