Piracy is a big problem for large software vendors licensors like Microsoft. As such, the Redmond giant is undertaking several anti-piracy efforts all over the world, and, of course, it attempts to make its software harder to crack through activation and validation. As The New York Times has discovered, however, the prevalence of pirated Microsoft software in Russia is giving the Russian authorities a pretence to raid the offices of outspoken advocacy groups or opposition media – supported by Microsoft lawyers. Update: Microsoft responds with a blog post that says all the right things, including “Microsoft will create a new unilateral software license for NGOs that will ensure they have free, legal copies of our products.”
The New York Times tells the story of the Baikal Environmental Wave, an environmental group in Irkutsk, which is currently trying to protest against prime-minister Vladimir Putin’s attempts to re-open a paper factory that has already caused environmental damage to Lake Baikal, a natural wonder – it’s the oldest and deepest lake in the world.
The group, however, fell victim to the latest trick in the book of Russian authorities when dealing with dissident groups: using the search for pirated software as an excuse to raid the offices of these dissident groups, confiscating computers in the process. Lawyers hired by Microsoft back the police in these political raids.
Baikal Wave had explicitly bought legal Microsoft software to shield themselves from these new types of raids, but that didn’t work, apparently. They also asked Microsoft for help in fending off the authorities, but Microsoft didn’t want to help. “Microsoft did not want to help us, which would have been the right thing to do,” Marina Rikhvanova, a Baikal Environmental Wave co-chairwoman, told The New York Times, “They said these issues had to be handled by the security services.”
The New York Times asked Microsoft for an official statement, and they got one. While the company does not publicly condemn the raids, they did say that they “[encourage] law enforcement agencies worldwide to investigate producers and suppliers of illegal software rather than consumers”.
“We take the concerns that have been raised very seriously,” said Kevin Kutz, director of public affairs at Microsoft, “When we grant powers-of-attorney to outside counsel to aid our antipiracy efforts, we vet candidates carefully, we bind them contractually to strict standards and protocols, we train them and we monitor their activities. They are accountable to us, and if their actions do not comport with professional ethics, anticorruption laws, or Microsoft policies, we terminate our relationship with them. Moreover, as we did with Baikal Environmental Wave, we will act to ensure due process is followed in antipiracy cases that involve Microsoft products.”
Kutz further added that based on feedback from advocacy groups, the company will make a number of changes in its anti-piracy efforts; they will more actively train their local anti-piracy lawyers, while also publishing the names of authorised representatives to prevent people from fraudulently claiming to represent the company. It will also promote the Infodonor program in Russia, which gives free Microsoft software to NGOs.
Still, The New York Times found several cases in which the police based its actions on claims from Microsoft’s lawyers. “Without the participation of Microsoft, these criminal cases against human rights defenders and journalists would simply not be able to occur,” said Sergey Kurt-Adzhiyev, editor of an opposition newspaper. Computers are marked as containing pirated software even before they have been examined. Worse yet, authenticity stickers from Microsoft were being removed from machines as they were being hauled away.
All in all, the findings from The New York Times seem to indicate that the Russian authorities are using the possibility of pirated software as an excuse to raid the offices of dissidents, with the support of Microsoft’s lawyers.
The story in The New York Times is well-worth the four-page read, and while some may consider it something that will only happen in countries like Russia and China, the reality of it is that our very own governments have the same kinds of power, or are at least trying to get it through nastiness like ACTA.
not to be rude but, you have a bit of a typo, Russia’s Prime ministers name is actually Vladimir Putin, not Poetin
That’s the way we Dutch spell it, so it slipped in there. Fixing.
I admit, I haven’t read the NYT article, but then again, I don’t have time to read every anti-Russia tirade that comes down the pike. It’s great sensationalism. But it’s not usually balanced.
Russia’s record on Lake Baikal is getting better:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4945998.stm
They moved the proposed pipeline away from the region at the cost of years to the project and billions in dollars, but as then President Putin said, if you have a spill, you can’t take it back. That type of forward thinking means you won’t have a spill in Lake Baikal – as you did in the Gulf of Mexico.
What people don’t understand about Russia – is when you have a problem, like piracy, you have to solve it, through law enforcement action.
This environmental group may not like an audit, but big deal. They are crying to the world ‘evil Russia’ because that is part of Russian society too – don’t get your way – the threat is we are going to make these wild claims and try to embarass the country in front of the world.
So while you can muse about Russian authoritarianism – and its a subject to understand – also muse about Russian civil society – this isn’t a country where everyone is a patriot and the only question is what is the best course for the country.
This is a country where everyone takes an extreme position – and tries to force their way. That isn’t just the government, but includes this environmental group as well – all this talk of suppression, don’t you believe it.
So the advocacy groups legally buys licensed Microsoft software, and still end up getting screwed over by the government by a pretence that it is pirated software.
Then Microsoft goes and hides, because its not interested in helping the common man from getting screwed over by a government that is using Microsoft’s own piracy issues as a cover to stifle dissent.
Guess your on your own from now on, Microsoft is only interested in your $ and nothing else.
More or less shows again how an American company has no interest in the concepts of freedom and democracy, the very things that allowed it to become a company in the first place….
Go Linux….
Exactly.
If one company screws over another – alas. If one company screws over its customers – alas, you have a choice. However, this is just plain wrong – ethically speaking.
It would make great publicity for Microsoft to come out on the side of Good for once. Make an example of legal software owners, show the world it’s better to buy than to pirate because of the protections you are afforded. The message this sends is that the environmental group might as well have pirated Windows and Office for all the difference it makes. Since everyone pirates Windows, obviously every Windows user is a pirate.
The irony of this statement is that without the participation of some of these American companies, Linux would not be where it is today.
Linux is where it is today because of the GPL, not necessarily because of how an American or any other national company, foundation, or individual has made contributions to Linux kernel (that includes Microsoft)
The GPL is what keeps the companies (and everyone else) in line who use and contribute to the Linux code. Linux would not be what it is today had it not been put under this particular license.
True, but let’s face facts – it would also not be where it is without the ‘evil American corporations’ that either funded, or directly contributed to its development.
Clearly, the best thing to do is to completely avoid running commercial-licensed software. This way, even the most unscrupulous of authorities cannot go after you, and confiscate your computers, through claiming “investigation of piracy” as an excuse. One cannot pirate software for which everyone has unconditional permission to execute.
In an environment like Russia, I am surprised that advocay groups apparently did not figure this out for themselves.
I’m sure something about patent violation could be trumped up. Even if they used GNUsense, they could blow some smoke about GUIs, or file management concepts, even if it’s all unfounded.
The “authorities” do not have a right to prosecute patent violations, only the patent holders do.
Cannot? They went after group that had fully licensed Microsoft software. What makes you think that using GNU would prevent authorities from raiding them, taking the computers and then slowly and carefully investigating if their software is indeed legal?
The only thing that can make software illegal is if it is copied without permission from the authors.
Any authorities, even Russian, would be unable to pretend that they did not know that everyone has such permission form the authors of GNU/Linux GPL software.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7034828.stm
We are talking about two different things. It does not matter if it is legal or not. I am sure that the organization immediately provided licenses, invoices, whatever authorities wanted. And it did not help.
So you say you are using Linux? Well, we have information from anonymous source that you are lying. So we will take all your computers and check. It won’t take more than 6 months so don’t complain.
Get Linux from an officially supported Russian distribution. Register it.
http://www.linux.com/archive/feed/119106
http://www.altlinux.com/
The authorities cannot simultaneously promote Linux for the Russian people on the one hand, and then confiscate the computers of people who are using it on the other.
That kind of thing can only happen in America concerning the products of American global monopoly corporations, and American-pushed political/commercial agendas such as ACTA.
Edited 2010-09-13 10:48 UTC
Of course they can. They can still claim “they may have pirated software” and raid their offices – whether they register x number of computers running Linux or not. The authorities could claim the advocacy groups may have more computers than the ones registered, they may claim they are running Office on WINE illegally, they may claim they run Windows illegally in virtualisation environments, etc. etc. etc.
While this is true, it is true only for absolute authoritarian governments in complete control. Most real-world governments need to have some sort of viable PR accountability. Most real-world governments cannot simply abuse citizens using outrageous claims that are easily seen to be lies.
Hence it is quite easy for a government to confiscate computers of groups who claim “we bought all our software properly licensed”. That is just a claim that could easily be a lie, and the group has publicly admitted that they are using commercial software that needs to be properly licensed. They might easily have licenses for only some machines.
However, if the persecuted group were to claim that “all of our software is free software, it is state-sponsored Linux” … then they have a credible position that has PR weight. It is easy to see that a machine is running Linux, you just have to turn it on, you don’t have to take the machine away. It is easy to show that your files were created by OpenOffice in ODF format.
For reasons of PR alone, the state must come up with a real reason for wanting to confiscate the computers now. “Suspicion of piracy” isn’t going to swing it now as a purported reason in the Internet age.
Sorry but this is just out in the stratosphere as far as bizarre speculation goes.
Why couldn’t they just accuse the group of being a front for a terrorist organization. Claim they are hiding weapons of mass destruction? Claim they have proof of links to Al Qaida – but for security reasons cannot release any of their sources or provide any proof of any of the claims.
The reality is its just an audit, and this is just the reaction to an audit.
And the NYT is just being the NYT.
When you find out a journalist has been poisened by plutonium – that’s frankly a credible case of interference by a government agency.
When you find an oil barron didn’t pay his taxes and went to jail – that is still reported as tyranny in the NYT – but as a long time Russia watcher – I dismiss the NYT version of events in that case.
There is an issue with authoritarianism in Russia – at the same time there is also continuing reforms – Oligarchs are being told they must pay taxes, or face jail.
Software piracy is slowly being cracked down on – and that’s a real initiative not a front for some cockamamy anti-enviornmental groups scheme – good grief that’s laughable.
Don’t you realize in Russia, as in the rest of the world, people want jobs. The government has zero need to explain why they saved a factory from closure.
Only in the tortured fantasy of some western observers is this some outlandish scheme to suppress a green movement.
Besides, Putin has proven that he’s somewhat of a supporter of Lake Baikal, he’s talked about the need to preserve the lake for future generations many times.
In reality, everything without installation disc is considered as counterfeit. You can’t install Linux and feel yourself protected. Well, in Russia nobody can feel safe except uber-corrupted ministry of internal affairs.
[qClearly, the best thing to do is to completely avoid running commercial-licensed software. This way, even the most unscrupulous of authorities cannot go after you, and confiscate your computers, through claiming “investigation of piracy” as an excuse. One cannot pirate software for which everyone has unconditional permission to execute.
In an environment like Russia, I am surprised that advocay groups apparently did not figure this out for themselves. [/q]
Running Linux (for example) wouldn’t protect you.
These people weren’t raided because they were running Windows, they were raided because they were suspected for running illegal copies of Windows.
You can be running Linux and still be a piracy suspect and sadly the only way to prove yourself innocent is to have your computers seized.
This is why Microsoft should have stepped in. But clearly they’ve always been more motivated by money than customer experience.
In the face of protests from the accused, this is not a PR-credible act for a government … at the very least it is considerably less credible than the case where the accused admit to be using commercial software.
It is quite possible (you could even go so far as to say easy) to run a perfectly clean “no piracy” shop using freedom software, but it is actually a bit of a task to ensure your operation is 100% copyright compliant when you are running commercial software on multiple machines.
Edited 2010-09-13 13:09 UTC
We’re talking about Russia. Russia is pretty much a dictatorship at this point. If even in the US large corporations control the legal agenda, how do you think Russia is going to be?
Russia’s government doesn’t need to worry about PR because they control most of the media, and use fear as a means to silence the rest.
Somehow I don’t think the Russian government has much to worry about when it comes to PR.
Edited 2010-09-13 14:04 UTC
Come on… it’s New York Times talking about Russia. IS there anything else to say?
Blaming MS is pretty silly when the Russian government will find all kinds of methods to target opponents.
They’ve already gone after quite a few organizations with accusations of not following tax code properly.
If North Korea were to hang someone over pirating Photoshop should we be angry with Adobe?
The Russian government doesn’t recognize the same rights that Western countries value. More shocking news at 11.
Edited 2010-09-12 23:25 UTC
You mean like mandatory filtering of internet access?
lol Or getting jailed without trial for years without the need to even explain why ? Or maybe kidnap or kill people in foreign countries ? Or bombing kids, ooops bombing collateral damages…
lol I’m a bit confused which western values he’s talking about
Russia doing what Russia does best. Damn, that country is fucked up (P.S.: I’m from Eastern Europe).
I don’t think that the essence of the NYTimes article is about using a software license agreement as a tool to misuse. I read a sentence like “lawyers retained by Microsoft have staunchly backed the police” as a claim that Microsoft is actively involved getting people convicted.
Well, certain groups of people are obsessed with Microsoft. I don’t like their software, too, but have more urgent business to do instead of finding new ways to insult Microsoft.
Far as I am concerned, after the DOJ case in 1999, they are much more open. Is it because they are forced to or did they have change of heart, frankly I don’t care. I think that making analogies between corporate entities and human individuals is pretty stupid. Thinking of some companies as “evil” and others as “good” won’t get you anywhere. Well, except, it would increase on line traffic and number of forum posts, which will make advertisers happy.
If there was no Microsoft, Russian authorities would have found another way to make life harder to opposition. They are creative in that kind of business and have long tradition that goes back in the days of Tsar.
Right, because that makes it ok. If we don’t then someone else would. Hey, I mean, what the hell. Who cares if someone sell weapons to both sides of a conflict right? Someone has to, you know. Who cares if you betray your country and sell military secrets to Al Queda or China or North Korea? They’d have found out sooner or later anyway.
Fatalism is awesome like that.
Don’t you think that you are exaggerating a bit ? Government offices in Russia are, probably, full of illegal Microsoft and other software and no one cares. Do you really believe that Microsoft is helping Russian government ? Perhaps they are sending hit squads at night to assassinate government opponents and copyright violators ? MSFT = Microsoft Special Forces Team, I have always suspected that…..
No.
Yeah, funny how MS laywers aren’t hitting the government, eh?
That’s what the article said and you made the argument that it would be ok if they did.
If Adobe were aiding in the investigations, then yes I would be mad at Adobe.
Think about the possibilities. If Governments want to target particular individuals or social groups the internet gives them incredible power. Want to get the community really against people who download commercial movies from torrents? It’s pretty easy really. Wrap some illegal pornographic material up into a file that’s made to look like a new or popular movie title, upload it somewhere and wait. Track the downloads, raid the residences or offices and bingo, media utopia.
The same method could be used over and over to target individuals or groups – activists, gays, religious or political persuasions – and the general population would buy into it in a heartbeat because the majority of people these days are “educated” by the media.
But no, that just all conspiracy theory, our governments would never do something as unethical as that. Would they?
Sounds like you just gave good reason why government should always be very starved of resources. Big government == huge potential for big abuse. Russia suffers from the same problem China has…excessive amounts of people try to get everything they can for as little as possible…it’s screw the other guy before he can screw you
Sounds like you just gave a very gave good reason why large corporations should always be very starved of rights. Big business == huge potential for big abuse. America suffers from a fairly unique problem … tiny numbers of people try to get everything they can for as little as possible…it’s screw the other guy all the time.
Edited 2010-09-13 10:36 UTC
Thats not an american problem, thats a human problem. In fact, that is the principal that capitalism is based on.
I live in a third world contry, over here NO ONE uses legal Windows (unless it came installed with maybe a laptop, but not even that because it’s usually just starter edition). So yeah, in most of the world (as in, most of the non-so-rich world) Windows is pirated.
If Windows couldn’t be cracked, everyone would use Ubuntu. Simple as that, and that would be far more threatening to them than lost sales due to piracy.
Also, note how they are only interested in going after large companies, not medium/small business or home users. This is for a good reason.
Which third world country are you in?
Florida
South America
If this was Reddit, you would have been ripped to shreds for calling South America a country.
Why would it be “more threatening” to them? As far as they are concerned, the third world using pirated copies of their software is non existent as it’s not providing them with any revenue or benefit of any kind. This “market” may as well go Ubuntu, I don’t get why they would care… unless there’s something I’m not thinking of.
Because all the piracy gives MS something very important: mindshare. Everyone uses WIndows, everyone expect to be using Windows, everyone learns on Windows, everyone develops in Windows.
OK. So there’s got to be a moment when that mindshare is beneficial to Microsoft. Which is when? Microsoft is a company and their goal is to sell something now or somehow prepare the field for future sales.
In that environment (which I’ve grown in by the way), it would even be detrimental: pirated copies are so common that the law abiding guy appears as a renegade (it goes beyond software: people sound they horn to ask you why on earth you stopped your car at the red light and dared slow them down! True story, I’ve experienced that last April). And making fun of others is a true sport in west Africa, at least in my home country. People will even call you stupid for spending money for things (almost) no one pays for. They’ll call Microsoft stupid and boast of “making rich Americans work for them, poor Africans”. You want to be the “legal” guy in the crowd? Then say hello to loneliness.
Microsoft, by it’s own admission, benefits from Piracy.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20070312/165448.shtml
If a (closed) software company were to plot a curve according to the percentage of piracy of its products along the x-axis vs the “benefits” of piracy on the y-axis, the resulting curve wouldn’t be constantly rising (i.e., the more piracy there is, the better for the company). I’m guessing that the curve would be “bell” shaped, and the “bell” would be lopsided since 0% piracy wouldn’t result in zero-profit, while 100% piracy would result in zero-profit (unless you go with the “we rely on selling support for all our funds” malarky). I suspect that the peak of the curve would be closer to x=0% piracy than to x=100% piracy. I’m guessing that 15% to 25% piracy would be optimal. Anything beyond that begins to hurt the company.
But I’m only guessing at what the optimal piracy rate actually is. I think it also depends on the software in question. For video games, for example, I think the optimal piracy rate is likely to be lower than it would be for operating systems or office suites. For pirated movies, I think the optimal piracy rate would be pretty close to zero. For music, I’d guess piracy rate of 5% for any given artist would be optimal (i.e. someone pirates just enough music to become a fan of the artist, then buys legit copies from then on). Something like Photoshop, I don’t think is affected much at all by casual piracy, but would hurt Adobe severely if professional art departments engaged in large scale piracy of that product.
But I’m just guessing on all of the above.