Microsoft pleased with legalization action

Feb 03, 2000

During the four months of campaigning the pirating rate has dropped by 11 percent, although admittedly, it currently stands at 81 percent in this country, representatives of the largest computer software company Microsoft said.

The head of the corporation in the Baltic states, Bo Kruse, told journalists on Tuesday that he was happy with the results of the action and added that only now the corporation "has started doing business in Lithuania."

Kruse said that he was happy about the drop in the pirating rate and the four-fold increase in the number of software distributors as well.

Speaking at a news conference on Feb. 1, Jolanta Pranceviciene, a lawyer from the Business Software Alliance representing the largest software manufacturers, said that a more active campaign against software pirates would now commence.

She said that until now the tax police was engaged in amassing evidence about the consumers of illegal software. Shortly, the police will start raiding the premisses to verify the collated evidence.

To date, the police already investigated 30 software distributors and 12 companies using software equipment. Illegal software was found in all 42 cases.

On court's decision, by administrative order 25 users of illegal software were fined and civil action was brought against another six consumers of illegal software.

SOCIAL BOOKMARKS:   Delicious   Digg   Reddit   Ask   Facebook   MrWong   Netvouz