how to defeat a bsa software audit lawyer

Do you need legal advice for a BSA audit?

Feb 19, 2019 · Even officers and directors can be held liable for software piracy or using "crack codes" to run expensive software. This video provides some of the top and most common defenses to raise to help win the case and end their audit review. If you need help, we offer low flat rate legal fees. Call us at 877) 276-5084).

Is this a sample letter for a BSA software audit letter?

Mar 12, 2016 · The typical legal demand letter from the BSA or SIIA will ask you to audit SOME or ALL of their member’s software. When they ask you …

What are the targets of BSA audits?

Dec 03, 2020 · Rob Scott. Robert represents mid-market and large enterprise companies in software license transactions and disputes with major software publishers such as Adobe, IBM, Microsoft, Oracle and SAP. He has defended over 250 software audit matters initiated by software piracy trade groups such as the BSA and SIIA.

When to buy or uninstall software after a BSA audit?

Dealing with a software audit from BSA The Software Alliance adds extra stress in an already stressful time. How to a respond to an audit from the BSA The Software Alliance will depend on a number of business and legal issues including: ... and IT-vendor audits, attorney-conducted audits are fully protected by the attorney-work product and ...

What happens if you don't respond to a BSA letter?

Failing to respond to a letter from the BSA, SIIA, or software publisher, will likely make your problems worse and could include litigation against you and your company. The date at the top of your letter from the BSA | The Software Alliance is a very important date. This date which is known as the audit effective date is critical because it is the only date that matters for purposes of comparing your software deployments on that date to the purchases you made prior to that date.

What are the legal issues involved in software piracy audits?

There are many legal issues involved in software piracy audits including what constitutes infringement, who has the burden of proof, how damages should be calculated, what constitutes proof of ownership and many others. These legal points should be vigorously argued in an effort to reduce software piracy settlement demands.

What is network discovery tool?

Network discovery tools are a necessary part of an internal investigation related to BSA | The Software Alliance cases. While these tools can be very helpful, the raw data they produce is some time inaccurate and may damages to your legal position in a BSA audit case. More often than not, they fail to exclude information outside the scope of the audit request. It is important to carefully interpret the discovery tool data comparing it not only to the entitlement records that the BSA will accept as proofs as well as applying sometimes complex licensing rules including those affording downgrade rights as well as the right to deploy on multiple devises for a single license. The licensing rule frequently require an understanding of the precise use case which discovery tools are completely incapable of evaluating. Consider your discovery data a starting point for an analysis not the final work-product.

What is the counterproductive response to a software piracy audit?

A natural but counterproductive response to a software piracy audit is to run out and purchase software. Avoid making purchases until a complete inventory and case assessment has been completed. In most cases, it’s a waste of money to purchase software in response to a software audit.

Is an attorney supervised audit report protected?

An attorney-supervised audit report is protected by attorney-client and attorney work-product privileges. In addition, if you use an outside vendor for IT services it is important to insure that the vendor has an NDA in place before any BSA audit case related information is shared with the vendor.

Can BSA audit cases be settled out?

If BSA audit cases cannot be settled out for court , the issue of evidence preservation is likely to be an issue in the court case. Targets of BSA | The Software Alliance audits need experienced counsel to guide through the balancing act of preserving evidence and making sure that IT business initiatives can proceed.

If you are a small or medium sized business in the United States, one of the major hassles you might find yourself involved in is a BSA or SIIA licensing audit. This blog will help you understand one way to respond

2018 Update – We have been informed by one BSA counsel that Business Software Alliance Audits (at least those featuring Microsoft) are NOT VOLUNTARY in nature and if you used Microsoft products (have them installed) then you are bound by their audit clause.

Introduction

There is a battle going on over unlicensed software use in corporate America. From what we have seen, the epicenter is largely focused around small to medium sized businesses (oten targeting companies that may be perceived as not having the financial means to hire a copyright counsel.

Contact our Copyright Infringement Law Firm

If your business or organization is facing receipt of a law firm “love letter” asking you to submit to a voluntary compliance audit, contact us to review your case and discuss your legal rights. Remember, officers and directors of a company can be held liable for copyright infringement.

Introduction

Our intellectual property & software compliance law firm is a leader in the United States in handling BSA software audits. Yes, we also handle Autodesk, Adobe, Siemens, Microsoft, Vero, Solidworks and others, but the Business Software Alliance is one of our favorite software trade associations to work with.

Who is the BSA?

The BSA stands for the “Business Software Alliance.” They are NOT a software company. They are NOT law enforcement.

Which law firm is the toughest to deal with?

One of the toughest law firms we ever dealt with was the Venable LLP firm. Not due to feeling inadequate or anything like that, but we were pushing them hard on licensing terms and finding it really difficult to get the types of results we wanted. We fought hard in every case with them.

What happens if we do not respond?

If you do not respond to a letter from one of the law firms above, or another one not listed, and if the firm has evidence of infringement in their possession (ex.

How does the process work?

Here is a general overview of the steps of the audit (this may differ in your case)

Do I need a software compliance lawyer on our team?

It is not required to hire BSA audit counsel to assist you. Although bear in mind they often have lawyers on their team, and many times we have seen opposing counsel “team up” putting more that one lawyer or support staff on their team. To me, it is important to consider that if you have never done something before (ex.

What happens if we find there are software shortages?

It is typical for a company to find shortages of software or over-installation, and even the use of crack codes during a software license audit with the BSA. Our law firm helps mitigate the damages once we are retained.