The FINANCIAL — Microsoft Georgia will shortly forward the information on infringers of licensed software copyrights to law enforcement bodies.
The FINANCIAL — Microsoft Georgia will shortly forward the information on infringers of licensed software copyrights to law enforcement bodies. Microsoft Georgia completed the next step of Mystery Shopper programconducted through market research on companies selling PCs, to verify if they were offering or selling unlicensed software to their customers. Microsoft representatives, within the program framework ,conducted control purchase of computers and came across with quite disturbing facts.
As David Asatiani, General Manager of Microsoft in Georgia, mentioned at the press conference held in Radisson BluIveria Hotel,over 40 shops were evaluated through phone calls and personal visits. In 25 shops there were at least some PCs and laptops with licensed copies of Windows, however even in these shops consultants were encouraging customers to purchase unlicensed software. According to David Asatiani,the rest of the checked resellers (15) openly offered PCs with unlicensed copies of software:
“The recent study revealed that 93% of PC resellers were found to be installing Microsoft software without the corresponding license and only 7% of PC resellers offered to install licensed Microsoft software. Customers are under risk if they are not aware of the fact that unlicensed software is a violation of Georgian copyright laws and that besides legal issues they may also face various technical and security problems if their PC is running unlicensed software. According to the latest Global Software Piracy Study for 2011 conducted by IDC,91% of the software used in Georgia is unlicensed, and the country has the highest piracy rate in Central and Eastern Europe and the 2nd highest in the world”.
“Despite the number of educational activities run by Microsoft Georgia over the last couple of years, the majority of PC shops in the country continue to sell computers with pirated Microsoft software. The time to take more serious actions has come.” – said EvgenyDanilov, License Compliance Director, Microsoft CEE HQ.
Representatives of Microsoft Georgia advise the population to request installation of only licensed software in case of purchasing PC. David Asatiani added quite strictly that the time had come to raise the issue of legal responsibility of those persons who misled the customers by offering only pirated products. Respectively, Microsoft Georgia will forward findings of the Mystery Shopper survey to law enforcement bodies. According to him, Microsoft licensed software are used in Georgia only in banking and telecommunication sectors and by public agencies and ministries.
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