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United States Piracy Software The Courts

US Navy Denies Pirating Software on 550K Computers, Says It Had Bought Licenses For 38 Machines (arstechnica.com) 170

Posted by msmash from the between-the-lines dept.
Earlier this year, the U.S. Navy was accused of pirating 3D software after testing a software package offered by Germany company Bitmanagement Software GmbH. The company had sued the United States of America for nearly $600 million. The U.S. Navy has now responded to the accusations, saying that though it did install the aforementioned software on "hundreds of thousands of computers within its network" without paying the German software maker for it, it did so with the consent of the software producer. Many might disagree, however. From a report on ArsTechnica: The Navy says that it could use the software on hundreds of thousands of computers with licenses for 38 machines. The Navy denied that a procurement official "acknowledged that additional licenses were necessary for it to distribute BS Contact Geo to its users." The government admitted that it had purchased 38 licenses, but "denies that the software licenses were 'limited,' as alleged by Plaintiff."
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US Navy Denies Pirating Software on 550K Computers, Says It Had Bought Licenses For 38 Machines More

US Navy Denies Pirating Software on 550K Computers, Says It Had Bought Licenses For 38 Machines

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  • rofl (Score:5, Interesting)

    by shaitand ( 626655 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:22AM (#53289215) Journal
    "The Navy denied that a procurement official "acknowledged that additional licenses were necessary for it to distribute BS Contact Geo to its users." The government admitted that it had purchased 38 licenses, but "denies that the software licenses were 'limited,' as alleged by Plaintiff.""

    Then why did they buy more than one?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by whoever57 ( 658626 )

      "denies that the software licenses were 'limited,' as alleged by Plaintiff."

      Umm, I don't think copyright works like that.

      • Umm, I don't think copyright works like that.

        This is not just about copyrights. It is mostly about contract law. Have you read the purchase contract or license? No? Me neither. So anything either of have to say about this matter is pointless and meaningless.

        • This is not just about copyrights. It is mostly about contract law. Have you read the purchase contract or license? No? Me neither. So anything either of have to say about this matter is pointless and meaningless.

          We can, however, reasonably speculate whether the Navy's claims are plausible.

          And as software developers, we can take this as a warning to make our contracts extra clear when dealing with the Navy.

          • Re:rofl (Score:5, Interesting)

            by jittles ( 1613415 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @01:23PM (#53290137)

            This is not just about copyrights. It is mostly about contract law. Have you read the purchase contract or license? No? Me neither. So anything either of have to say about this matter is pointless and meaningless.

            We can, however, reasonably speculate whether the Navy's claims are plausible.

            And as software developers, we can take this as a warning to make our contracts extra clear when dealing with the Navy.

            Maybe the Navy is arguing that they had 38 seats that could be active at one time. Maybe they installed the software on 550k machines but only had 38 active users at a time? I don't know why they would install the software on so many machines, but who knows? Without the contract and an understanding of the software, we can only speculate.

            • Re:rofl (Score:5, Insightful)

              by Solandri ( 704621 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @03:32PM (#53291157)
              Or they're creating one huge standardized install image containing all software which could conceivably be needed, and installing it on all their computers to simplify IT administration. Mainly to eliminate the need for someone to have to dig through the basement of a warehouse or run to the store to find an install disk when they suddenly find out they need a program and it isn't on the computer - kinda important when you're in the middle of the Pacific ocean. And they only paid for 38 licenses because that's how many computers they're actually planning to use it on at this time.

            • Maybe the Navy is arguing that they had 38 seats that could be active at one time. Maybe they installed the software on 550k machines...

              Which is why this lawsuit should serve as a warning: make sure your contract is bullet proof and crystal clear, because this contract obviously somehow failed to be.

          • Make it clear in the license about how many machines or devices it is allowed to run on. Because no matter how bizarre you think the misunderstanding might be, there are contractors who operate that way and contractors who don't. Every single contract they have is unique. If you're dealing with the government then never ever rely upon them following the common practice used in corporations (best not to even assume corporations follow an unwritten common practice).

            We haven't seen the contract so it's just

        • There probably isn't a contract. They most likely picked up the 38 licenses on a p-card, and then their proof of concept test moved to full production.... Just like all the other government It projects.

    • My guess is that, the way they saw it, they needed 38 licenses for employees doing X with the software (e.g. producing new content). Meanwhile, those purchased licenses (again, as they see it) also allowed them to have free reign to install it for everyone else who is doing the lesser task Y (e.g. viewing content).

      • Re:rofl (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Culture20 ( 968837 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:43AM (#53289391)
        Another possibility is that the Navy thought the 38 licenses were for concurrent use a la network licenses, or were restricted to specific users or hardware tokens, meaning that having the software on 550,000 machines isn't the same as being able to use it on all 550,000 machines at the same time, or by 550,000 users.

        • Re:rofl (Score:5, Interesting)

          by shaitand ( 626655 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @12:29PM (#53289761) Journal
          It's possible but the Navy does this all kinds of things. They buy a handful of licenses that are absolutely not concurrent then roll it out in a desktop image to the thousands of machines. The Navy is big on copyright infringement. It isn't just software either, you'll find bootleg movies/music content being played to large groups in barracks all over the place.

        • Oh don't worry, the Donald will call Angela on the phone and explain that because the Navy is getting sued for $600 million, he's going to have to make some cut-backs on civilian staffing at US bases in Germany to take up the slack, how NATO is kind of obsolete and our allies really need to step up and be more responsible for paying for their own defense. After that the DOD is going to ask the vendor how they knew about the over-installs and how the DOD frowns on call-home features in software on DOD comput

        • Yes, that's what the Navy claims in its official answer to the claims by the plaintiffs.

          15. [...] Defendant denies that the licenses were limited to installation of BS
          Contact Geo on a total of 38 Navy personal computers, and Defendant further avers that the
          Navy procured concurrent-use network-installation licenses of BS Contact Geo.

          By the way, avers means asserts. So the sentence should read as "Defendant further asserts that the Navy procured concurrent-use network-installation licenses...".

    • It's a bit of an extreme example but plenty of companies sell network based licenses. So you can install on an infinite number of machines, but can only be running simultaneously on 38 machines at once.

      • But then it comes down to: Did this software have such a license? If so was the license server configured for only allowing 38 uses at once?

        • When it comes down to that, the story is awfully vague on what those 38 licenses were for: Named users? Node locked? Floating? Site? Enterprise? Creation? Playback?

      • Or there are site wide licenses. So 38 different licenses could means 38 different facilities. For any particular scenario you can think of for a license, it's likely the US government has dealt with that type of license at some point.

        • Then there would be no reason to sue. The software vendor would know if licences were floating or site or any other kind that would make 500000 copies legal.

    • 38 is DOD-speak for 1.

    • Look, 500,000 heavily armed soldiers looking at you in a menacing way aren't wrong, are they? Think about it.

      • Technically, as it's the Navy, they would be Sailors - not Soldiers. And as the Navy is the only US armed force that owns and operates a nuclear powered rail gun, I would much rather take my chances with the Soldiers...
        • Technically, as it's the Navy, they would be Marines which for some reason people forget are actually part of the Navy and not a separate branch.

          • Re:rofl (Score:5, Informative)

            by kelemvor4 ( 1980226 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @01:01PM (#53289971)

            Technically, as it's the Navy, they would be Marines which for some reason people forget are actually part of the Navy and not a separate branch.

            Not for almost 200 years, if this is to be believed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U... [wikipedia.org]

            In 1834, the United States Marine Corps came under the Department of the Navy.[46] Historically, the Navy has had a unique relationship with the USMC, partly because they both specialize in seaborne operations. Together the Navy and Marine Corps form the Department of the Navy and report to the Secretary of the Navy. However, the Marine Corps is a distinct, separate service branch[47] with its own uniformed service chief – the Commandant of the Marine Corps, a four-star general.

            • The Commandant is, indeed, the head of the Marine Corps; however, it is definitely part of the Department of the Navy. (See the Marine logo.)

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by cdrudge ( 68377 )

          And as the Navy is the only US armed force that owns and operates a nuclear powered rail gun

          The Navy actually operates one? As in it's installed on a ship and actually functional? I thought they were all still in design/testing phase with only the USS Zumwalt having excess power capacity to fully power one.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by afidel ( 530433 )

            No, the Zumwalt class have the power, but so will the Ford class carriers. The Ford carriers were designed with solid state lasers and rail guns in mind, they produce 3x the power of the Nimitz class and have a vastly superior distribution network to enable many high power hard points.

          • The Navy actually operates one?

            No.. it's too expensive.... :-)

            https://news.slashdot.org/stor... [slashdot.org]

    • Which license did the software in question use?

      • Re:What license? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Anubis IV ( 1279820 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @01:00PM (#53289965)

        A proprietary license written specifically for that project, since the plaintiff indicated that there were terms specific to the project that the Navy is in breach of. For instance, the license stipulates that the Navy agrees to keep some tracking functionality in place, presumably so that the company could track the number of installations during the trial phase in order to ensure that the Navy didn't engage in any shenanigans. After installing the software hundreds of thousands of times, the Navy disabled that functionality without having first negotiated a new contract that allowed them to do so, so the number of installations may actually be far higher than the 550K number that the plaintiff is aware of.

    • Not only that, but if you read into the details of the suit, you find out that the Navy didn't even stick to the terms of the licenses they acknowledge they had with the company. Apparently, they purposefully disabled functionality built into the software that allowed the developer to track the number of installations during the trial phase of the deployment. The license explicitly said that the functionality needed to stay in place, presumably so that the company could find out if the Navy pulled a stunt l

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by martinX ( 672498 )

      "The Navy denied that a procurement official "acknowledged that additional licenses were necessary for it to distribute BS Contact Geo to its users." The government admitted that it had purchased 38 licenses, but "denies that the software licenses were 'limited,' as alleged by Plaintiff.""

      Then why did they buy more than one?

      Because government is full of ignorant spenders who don't care about the taxpayer dollars they waste.

  • Was anybody actually using the software? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by CajunArson ( 465943 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:23AM (#53289223) Journal

    Copying the software to those machines might be a technical violation of the license, but was there any evidence that those unlicensed copies were ever actually used?

    Otherwise, this is more of a theoretical violation as opposed to showing that the Navy was using software that it just didn't want to pay for.

    • Re:Was anybody actually using the software? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Calydor ( 739835 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:28AM (#53289259)

      It seems pretty unlikely that less than 0.1% of the total installations would be used at any given point in time. I mean, you can install on multiple machines to make things easier and faster, but THAT MANY?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by TWX ( 665546 )
        It was probably part of their standard image.

        Some software uses the local network or even the Internet connection to the vendor to determine active count.

      • It seems pretty unlikely that less than 0.1% of the total installations would be used at any given point in time.

        0.1% would still be 15 times the amout of licenses they had purchased.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Calydor ( 739835 )

          Indeed, miscounted the decimals. Not that "Less than 0.01% of the installations were in use!" sounds any better for their efficiency.

    • Re:Was anybody actually using the software? (Score:4, Informative)

      by shaitand ( 626655 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:47AM (#53289439) Journal
      It doesn't matter if they were used or not. It is copying that is restricted by copyright law and requires a violation not use, you can use copyrighted material however you like copyright grants no control over that to the software producer. They could have burned 40 copies of the disk and stuck them on a shelf gathering dust and still be guilty of 39 copyright violations (you get one backup under fair use provisions, you lose it in practice under the DMCA if they've used copy protection on it thought).

      • Re:Was anybody actually using the software? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @12:14PM (#53289649)

        You've never read a site license.

        Don't feel too bad; nobody has except the DoD lawyers. Yes, I had to wait 2 months for legal to finish reading a license to let me buy a $12 piece of software.

        And yes, nobody really cared that I spent $3K in lawyer time for a $12 piece of software.

        • Do you think that is unique to the military?

          I was an engineering intern that wanted a $150 HTML editor for my semester project of updating a part of the company website. I spent at least a day writing a proposal to get a $150 HTML editor, getting paid for this time. So that the proposal could disappear for much of my internship, where I don't know who looked at it, and those people were getting paid to look it over. Not near the scale you speak of but I'm sure it happens all the time.

          The alternative is t

    • Copying the software to those machines might be a technical violation of the license, but was there any evidence that those unlicensed copies were ever actually used?

      Otherwise, this is more of a theoretical violation as opposed to showing that the Navy was using software that it just didn't want to pay for.

      "USED" vs "Installed" may not be something the owner differentiates in the license. In which case it would not matter if the software was actually used.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by iCEBaLM ( 34905 )

      I have no idea of the terms of the license given to the Navy which may have granted to them the ability to copy the software to any computer they wanted, however, this is not theoretical.

      Absent any additional rights transfer, whether or not a copyrighted work is used or not doesn't matter, all that is required for a violation to occur is for a copy to be made.

  • Contract Law 101 (Score:5, Funny)

    by paiute ( 550198 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:28AM (#53289261)
    Don't sue parties armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles.
    • If you are going to sue a party let it be one that can afford a stockpile of 3,500 single use $1.41 million a piece,Tomahawk cruise missiles

      • Although their assets are rather tied up in inventory. Which does admittedly have a resale value but there will be other laws governing who would make an acceptable buyer. I don't think it's a long list.

        $600 million? Maybe they're set on 425 cruise missiles as settlement?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by MikeKD ( 549924 )
      That's covered in the graduate-level course.

  • What Happened To NMCI? (Score:3)

    by HangingChad ( 677530 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:30AM (#53289275) Homepage
    NMCI was supposed to prevent all that. Is it gone now or still not working?

  • We didn't! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MarcoPon ( 689115 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:37AM (#53289341) Homepage
    Never underestimate the negotiating potential of a fully armed aircraft carrier. Or more than one.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ghoul ( 157158 )

      Never underestimate the power of a virus which can make a modern network centric aircraft carrier a sitting duck.( I saw it on Independence Day so it must be true)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tom ( 822 )

      Silly, of course. Germany doesn't need an army anymore. All it needs to do to make everyone in every government office and three-letter-agency in the USA shit their pants is to leave NATO and make a free-trade agreement with Russia. It would pull the rest of the EU with it and the american economy would crater faster than you can say "oh shiiiiiit".

  • Given that the copy protection / license management was disabled by the vendor and 38 copies were purchased, I have to wonder if the Navy purchased a 38 user concurrent license vs a per machine license or believed they had done so. If so, the software is responsible for communicating with a license manager to ensure that a maximum of 38 machines can use the software at a given time.

    • One wonders how practical that would be on a submerged submarine. It would be difficult enough on a surface vesel.
    • No, even if so the Navy is responsible for making sure they comply with the terms they agreed to not the vendor. The vendor might well require the use of something like a license manager to ensure the same and provide incentive not to pirate the software but it is piracy to violate the terms whether there are technical restrictions or not.

  • Concurrent users vs installations (Score:3)

    by bruce_the_loon ( 856617 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @11:38AM (#53289351) Homepage

    Part of the user discussion on the article is about whether the licenses are for concurrent users or installations.

    Now the software uses a central Flexnet licensing server and that supports a license pool and concurrent users. It depends on the terms of the license, but if the Flexnet allows an instance to start, then by my definition, that instance is licensed.

    • and what if they need to have it run on systems that are very locked down / have limited out side networking?

      Need to have more then central Flexnet licensing server for different areas do to locked down networks?.

    • Apparently the vendor disabled copyright management at the Navy's request. I'm guessing the Navy has a specific resilience requirement that no software can rely on network availability, cos war can, y'know, break things.

  • Arr matey (Score:5, Funny)

    by mu51c10rd ( 187182 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @12:41PM (#53289837)

    The US Navy are pirates? Can't wait for the new whites and blues to be issues with eye patches...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by k6mfw ( 1182893 )
      they're not pirates, they are privatized (or whatever that term was for ships aligned with the British Empire). uhmm, yes it's a joke or maybe not as more of the US military is contracted out.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by WallyL ( 4154209 )

        You keep looking for that word: privateer. I do not think that word means what you think it means.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by TheCarp ( 96830 )

      Works for me, our foreign policy is just a few steps removed from "Plunder".

  • Written Contract vs Oral Contract (Score:3)

    by penguinoid ( 724646 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @12:53PM (#53289903) Homepage Journal

    I'm no expert, but if the representative on the phone promises something that makes it an oral contract, and could potentially supersede the written contract and especially any EULA. For example, if they specifically asked whether the contract meant 38 concurrent users vs 38 installs and they were told it was concurrent users. Of course, proving it in court is a different story.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by msauve ( 701917 )
      It depends on whether that rep had the authority to do so. Just because the bank janitor says you can take some cash from the vault, doesn't mean you're not stealing.

      • Ever actualy been on a conf call for a big company every sales money has a vp title that implies authority to enter into contracts.

  • Honestly, they should have contracted the work to a company that would make the program they needed based on something free like blender and then bought 3d/texture asset data. When you pay for a license, you are at the mercy of the copyright holder, even if you are the Navy.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Megol ( 3135005 )

      LOL! I hope you are kidding, for some uses it can actually be orders of magnitude of price difference between buying some _expensive_ software and taking open source software and funding development (in the case of blender probably rewrite the whole lot). Not in the favor of open source. Oh, and that assumes you can wait let's say 10 years on the result.

      Or else one could buy that _expensive_ software and after 10 years of updates have a cheaper and more capable alternative.

  • If you look at the demo video on their website - http://www.bitmanagement.com/en/demos/geo - it appears to be a browser-based plugin; the actual "demo" link tries to download a file called "BS_Contact_VRML-3DX.exe from www.bitmanagement.com. The demo shows a user-controlled fly-over of an urban area, and seems highly applicable to a lot of military uses. (the software to *create* the model seems to be different - the software named in the suit is the viewer for the 3D models)

    It's quite possible that the 500

  • Site License (Score:4, Informative)

    by BrookHarty ( 9119 ) on Tuesday November 15, 2016 @02:18PM (#53290585) Journal

    Oracle tried to do this when I was ATT Wireless, we had a site license for oracle. When we ran a contact address book with multiple users, oracle tried to make us pay per server, then tried pay per user for millions of users. Oracle kept calling me in operations to try to get me to pay, I passed it onto legal and they smacked the shit outta them.

    We had a great deal, 5 or so million a year for an unlimited license, and you can believe me, everywhere a database was needed, we ran mostly oracle.

    (This was 10+ years ago, so Who knows now)

  • The summary is terrible. There are these things called site licenses. TFA indicates the developer claims the software was only licensed for 38 devices.
  • You know sex is only dirty when the other guy does it. By what magical use of logic does a license for 38 machines equal a license for an unlimited number of machines? Now what would happen to you or me if we purchased 38 copies of Windows 10 and decided to send out 10,000 copies? This is why it is time to admit that the absurd notion that we are all equal before the law is identified as 100% bullshit.

    • two words, nuclear fucking weapons. the U.S. Navy has them, you and me and Bitmanagement do not

  • Just double the number of licenses and add 300,000 (instead of 30)

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