City of Tigard fined for using illegal software

The Business Software Alliance will inspect city computers twice a year for the next three years

The Times, Feb 22, 2007, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (4 Reader comments)

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TIGARD — The city of Tigard has agreed to pay $75,493 in penalties to a trade association representing software publisher Adobe Systems Inc. after the city failed to provide proofs of purchase for 100 Adobe and nine Autodesk programs installed on city-owned computers.

According to a staff summary of the agreement, attorneys representing the Business Software Alliance sent a letter to the city in mid-August stating that BSA had been advised that the city had installed on its computers more copies of the software from Adobe Systems and Autodesk than it was licensed to use. BSA is an organization that concentrates on copyright and intellectual property protection.

The city’s summary did not mention how BSA was informed of the possible lack of licenses for the software programs. Tigard City Manager Craig Prosser noted, however, that BSA does solicit tips on software piracy via a link on its Web site.

Following the letter, the city had a software audit performed on its computers, which showed that many of the programs in question were old versions of the software or were no longer in use.

Prosser said one of the main things discovered by the audit was that whenever city employees installed a newer version of the Autodesk program the older versions were not automatically removed.

“So the audit actually let us clean up a lot on the computers,” Prosser said.

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