Business Software Alliance

Objectives

The Business Software Alliance is a lobby created by American large companies to fight against the hacking of software. The BSA contributes positively to the American trade balance and one can suppose that the US government supports it.

In France, the BSA uses a sometimes aggressive communication (call to the denouncement, threatens of imprisonment) and is presented to the occasion like an auxiliary of justice. Not having any capacity of police force, it cannot have access to the computers of a company as it claims it sometimes.

Every year, it publishes an annual study where it publishes an evaluation of the software hacking. The diffused figures are obtained by extrapolation while being based on a basket average of software by computer, multiplied by the sales figures of material and compared with the sales of software. This method is disputed since in particular it takes account neither of the use of free software, neither of the re-use of the software licenses, nor of specificities of certain countries. In 2005, the rate of hacking is thus estimated at 35% for the world (47% for the France, against 21% for the the United States).

List members (incomplete)

References

Random links:

Carl Andre | Clarence Anglin | KK Šentjur | Esther Baxter | Douyge