By Jorge Sukarie, president of ABES (Brazilian Association of Software Companies)
The national software industry has enormous potential to develop innovative solutions, although it still needs incentives both for research and development and to stop the flow of piracy that delays the growth of the sector and prevents Brazil from becoming more competitive.
The unbridled action of the counterfeiting trade made the CNCP – National Council for Combating Piracy, an agency linked to the Ministry of Justice, choose the need to have a dimension of this impact in Brazil, with more exact numbers referring to crime, as the main action for the new Plan to Combat Piracy, announced on the 15th of May. To this end, several activities were suggested to be carried out until 2016 and which are based on three main axes of action: educational, economic and inspection. The objective is to obtain a more accurate radiography of piracy in the country.
Aware of its role and the importance of supporting the government, ABES – Brazilian Association of Software Companies launched, this year, the Legal Entrepreneur Campaign www.empreendedorlegal.org.br, with the objective of making Brazilian businessmen from all sectors aware of the delay and damage they can cause to their segment and to the Brazilian economy when using counterfeit copies of computer programs in their company. The Campaign points out the legal and technical risks, in addition to highlighting the benefits of betting on legal software.
As well as this campaign, there are also other initiatives in Brazil such as the Free City of Piracy program. Created by CNCP and managed by ETCO – Brazilian Institute of Ethics in Competition, this action aims to integrate inspection and enforcement agencies to act at the municipal level. In the city of São Paulo alone, the program has already disclosed the seizure of more than R$ 2 billion counterfeit products that took place between December 2010 and October 2012.
The portal for Anonymous Whistleblowing Against Pirate Software www.denunciepirataria.org.br created by ABES and BSA – The Software Alliance is also part of these national initiatives against the crime of piracy, which in the country has specific punishments. This year alone, this communication channel received more than 2,500 complaints and contributed, in March, to the seizure of 550 illegal media, carried out by local authorities in 25 IT resellers suspected of practicing illegal trade.
But to reduce the current 53% of software piracy in the country, all this great enterprise of the government and the entities that defend the Brazilian software industry needs, and a lot, the awareness of companies and users. There is no advantage in buying a counterfeit product, but an investment in this crime that steals jobs in the country, reduces tax revenue that would be reversed in benefits for society, and still encourages organized crime.
For those who still believe they are doing good business competing in the market with illegal software licenses, a study carried out in 95 countries, recently released by the BSA – The Software Alliance, concluded that legal software brings greater economic stimulus than pirated software. Just 1% increase in legal software usage worldwide would bring a global return of US$ 73 billion. By contrast, with the same growth, the use of pirated software would add less than a third to the global economy or about US$ 20 billion.
This year, IDC also issued a warning to companies that still believe it is convenient to compete in the market illegally and have not provided an audit of their technology park to check which licenses are active on their machines.
The research institute pointed out that the chances of infection by unexpected malware reach one in three consumers and three in 10 companies. As a result, consumers will spend 1.5 billion hours and US$ 22 billion to identify, repair and recover their equipment from the impact of malicious code. Transnational corporations must spend US$ 114 billion to deal with the impact of a cyber attack, when they could invest in development, innovation and new jobs.
The new Piracy Combat Plan also foresees investments in innovation and entrepreneurship, fundamental areas for suppliers to be able to create new offers, with the same quality and more competitive prices in relation to the pirate market.
All these efforts with repression actions, market research and awareness campaigns have the objective of informing that the bet on legal software is not only the acquisition of an original product. It is an investment in the professional who works in the market, in the evolution of technology, in the employment generated from research and development in new software. In this way, the whole society is benefited, making the economy more heated and the country more competitive.
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