BSA launches online viral to educate software piracy

11 May 2006 12:15 GMT / By Stuart Miles

The Business Software Alliance (BSA) has launched a new online game which it hopes will educate on the risks associated with software piracy and the various ways that it can occur within an organisation.

Software Cluedo, developed in association with Hasbro, will offer players of the game the chance to assume the role of the managing director.

As they wander from department to department, through the virtual office, the game will present a series of possible scenarios from which they must deduce how illegal software proliferated within the business.

They include causes of software piracy (such as license duplication, inauthentic fonts and server piracy) as well as consequences (such as viruses and spyware).

At the end of each scenario, they must identify the culprit. By accurately identifying the culprit within as short a time possible, players can register their score and compete for the chance to win genuine licensed software products from the BSA member companies.

There will be weekly prizes as well as a grand prize and the software on offer includes Adobe Photoshop Elements, Apple iLife ’06, CorelDRAW X3, Corel Paint Shop Pro X, Symantec Norton Internet Security, Monotype Imaging and Microsoft Office Professional Edition 2003.

At the end of the game, players are presented with the opportunity to report software piracy.

Recently published research by YouGov found that 27% of respondents would report cases of illegal software use. Disgruntled workers are even more likely to report illegal goings-on. 65 per cent would consider reporting the company if they felt their employer treated them unfairly, and more than 1 in 4 (27%) said that large salary rises for the board or poor salary reviews for staff could spur them to act.

The game can be found at www.bsa.org/softwarecluedo

Full tags

Software, Online, Software piracy, BSA