Impact of Software Piracy
Software piracy is a serious problem in the Asia Pacific, with 60 percent of the software installed on personal computers obtained illegally, and dollar losses due to PC software piracy amounting to almost US$21 billion. (Ninth Annual BSA Global Software Piracy Study).
Software piracy also affects local software companies who are crippled by competition from pirated software and by piracy of their own products. It also has a dampening effect on the broader IT industry – an IDC study found that for every $1 of software sold in a country, there would be another $3 to $4 of additional revenues for local IT service and distribution firms.
But software piracy’s damaging impact is not confined to the software industry. In fact, software piracy has a harmful effect on the economic health of a country as a whole. It discourages entrepreneurship, prevents creation of more jobs, limits software choice, and lowers government tax revenues that can be spent on public projects.
Conversely, in a separate study commissioned by the BSA and conducted by IDC, reducing software piracy in Asia by just 10 percentage points over a four year period could generate 350,000 new jobs, almost US$41 billion in economic growth, and close to US$9 billion in tax revenues.
Everyone benefits when software piracy is reduced. Help fight software piracy.