Pub. 2018 Issue 1

19 • Cloud software that you access for a regular fee in order to use it. The fee is often monthly. People refer to it as SaaS (Software as a Service), hosted applications, or hosted software. When you buy software and sign agreements, those agreements determine the legal rights you have to use the software from that point forward. Violate the agreement and it becomes copyright inf r ingement. Since copyr ights are protected by federal law, that’s why infringement is such a big deal. What are some ways you might unintentionally infringe the copyright? • Software comes in home editions and business editions. It is against the rules to install a version designed for home at work. • If the agreement says the license can only be installed on a single computer, you don’t have the right to copy it to other computers. • If you have outdated software and the licenses have expired, that means you can’t use them legally anymore. • Once software has been installed on a particular computer, you probably don’t have the right to move it to a different computer without buying a new license. Financial penalties for violating copyright laws accidentally can be as much as $30,000. That is calculated per device, per infringement, per software, and per violation, so liability multiplies fast if you have many copies in many different places. Violating copyright laws deliberately has a much heavier financial fine; the base price is $150,000 instead of $30,000, but again you have to multiply that number by the number of violations. Worse, you might have to pay the legal fees of the copyright holder, and the case is probably a federal one. If you think the copyright violation won’t be discovered, think again. Some software is built to detect piracy. That kind of software won’t necessarily report you … just disable key features. But it doesn’t stop there. Software manufacturers have a bounty-hunting association called the Business Software Alliance (BSA). Members include companies such as Adobe, Autodesk, Oracle, and other major computer software companies. Another bounty-hunting association is the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA), with members from the media, publishing, and software industries. Bounty-hunter associations offer a reward to encourage people to report copyright software violations. Why do people repor t copyright violations? Sometimes people who have been f ired will get their revenge by reporting on an ex-employer. Also, there’s a financial motive. If someone does report a violation and loses the case against them, that can mean a reward of anything from $5,000 to $1 million. What happens when BSA or SIIA investigates your dealership for copyright infringement? You get an intimidating letter from them inviting you to perform an audit and submit the results. If you don’t cooperate, then the association attacking you can then take you to court. Do they really want to go to court? No; that is chancy and expensive, so they would prefer to make a settlement with you. Either way, however, you potentially end up paying a lot of money. It is a profitable business for them, especially because these associations often target smaller businesses and do their best to convince the businesses that the only way to make the problem go away is to pay a lot of money. It can be hard to defend yourself from this kind of professional, organized shake- down unless you have a policy in place. How do you protect yourself so that you can focus on selling cars instead of on legal problems? You keep complete, meticulous records. Those records will then make it possible to prove you and your dealership have done nothing wrong and, if necessary, you can then stand up for yourself in court. How do you start? Write a Computer Code of Ethics for the dealership. You should also seriously consider either establishing an IT department or hire a trustworthy consultant or another company to help you with IT issues such as this one. The Computer Code of Ethics It should be specifically designed to help you avoid copyright infringement. Once written, train your IT personnel to follow it. You, your employees, and any IT personnel can then do the following: • Buy and load all software in accordance with the EULA. Purchase volume licenses where that applies. • Keep receipts and a record of all license key numbers. • If the dealership buys a new computer, keep the receipt and the licensing documentation for it. • If the dealership buys a used computer, check to see whether the software license can be legally transferred. That may or may not be possible to find out. If it isn’t, buy a new license for the computer.  It can be hard to defend yourself from this kind of professional, organized shake-down unless you have a policy in place. How do you protect yourself so that you can focus on selling cars instead of on legal problems? You keep complete, meticulous records. Those records will then make it possible to prove you and your dealership have done nothing wrong and, if necessary, you can then stand up for yourself in court.