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Symantec files piracy lawsuit against counterfeit ring

By Justin Mann

On December 14, 2006, 11:03 AM

To the tune of $15 Million, Symantec has filed suit and is going against a software piracy ring that has been selling counterfeit versions of their software for the past three years. Filed a month ago, the suit claims that a string of companies in both the U.S. and Canada were selling pirated copies of various Symantec software, such as Norton AV, PCAnywhere and Veritas Backup Exec. All three of these are very popular in the workplace, meaning that a large number of businesses may be operating counterfeit software without even being aware of it. While the companies named in the suit are only U.S. and Canadian companies, the ring itself is said to be a global one. It seems from the article that the pirated software wouldn't have been very hard to identify:

Customers who paid for the software received disks bearing Symantec's logo but wrapped in plain white sleeves. The disks, which came without documentation, would not install or work properly and in some cases included malicious software designed to steal sensitive information from the purchaser's computer, Paden said.
Nevertheless, it happened. According to Symantec, they lose $50 Million a year due to piracy

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5 comments

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  1. December 14, 2006 11:32 AM
    TimeParadoX said:
    Who... Would get a pirated copy of Norton?I wonder how they actually sold those to companies because everyone knows norton has really bad securityThat's probably why you see 1000s of businesses & companies getting hacked[Edited by TimeParadoX on 2006-12-14 12:31:21]
    Reply
  2. December 14, 2006 9:58 PM
    nimo333 said:
    There are AVG and Anti-Vir which are the best and they are free, only an unexperienced PC user gets Norton.
    Reply
  3. December 15, 2006 2:29 AM
    TimeParadoX said:
    Lol yeah that's true, I seen a commercial on the TV with a ISP using Norton as a Server protector... It seems that even ISPs are noobs with security?
    Reply
  4. December 15, 2006 5:52 AM
    Jesse_hz said:
    I agree with nimo, AVG and AntiVir are the best free alternatives.
    Reply
  5. December 15, 2006 9:46 AM
    t-tek said:
    norton is the best anti virus macafee sucks balls
    Reply

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