The problem is compounded by countries who have no, or do not enforce, copyright or intellectual property laws. Much of the software that is pirated comes from companies in the US. A Gift Of Fire shows us the value of business software produced by U.S. companies that was pirated worldwide was $8.08 billion. This is quite a staggering amount of money for one industry to lose to theft. Margaret Kane explains annual losses due to piracy in Latin America are about $1.1 billion U.S. dollars and that Software piracy rates in Latin America are around 80 percent. This is a tremendous amount of revenue, especially for poorer, developing nations whose very survival depends upon the health of their consumer markets. Thankfully, and with guidance from other nations, Central America has begun to train special enforcement squads to detect software piracy and enforce laws covering the situation. Ms. Kane also tells us that new intellectual property laws have been passed in Mexico and Peru and are pending in Brazil.Not all corners of the world have such progressive views on software theft, parts of Asia and Africa are the worst in the world. Berta Gomez found that Among regions, the greatest dollar losses occurred in the Asia-Pacific area, with an estimated $3,700 million in lost revenues due to piracy. Revenue losses in Japan were about $1,200 million, in India $255 million, in China $700 million, and in Korea $515 million. The U.S. has increasingly put pressure on many Asian countries, but diplomacy can only go so far.Online auctions are another method used to facilitate the spread of pirated software. Troy Wolverton places faith in a study showing that on one specific day, there were found to be 544 auctions involving pirated software on eBay, 343 on Excite@Home and 478 on Yahoo. This study claims that more than 90 percent of the software auctions available were for pirated software.Preventative MeasuresWith the amount of software bein...
