 | iBackups Made over $5 Million in Pirated Software Profits, Will Serve Jail-Time and Pay Damages |
Nathan Peterson, owner and operator of iBackups, pled guilty in a U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va. to two counts of criminal copyright infringement for illegally copying and selling nearly $20 million worth of computer software. Working on behalf of its members, including Macromedia and Symantec, the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) first alerted the Federal Bureau of Investigation of possible software piracy in 2003 and subsequently worked with investigators and prosecutors to assure that Peterson’s operation was stopped and that he was properly punished. Sentencing guidelines call for a prison term of 70-87 months. Peterson has agreed to pay restitution in the amount of $5,402,448.
iBackups sold pirated software over the Internet, claiming it was “backup software” - legal copies of software to be used by the software owner for backup in case of system crashes. It is, however, illegal to resell such copies. iBackups used Google “ad words” extensively to recruit customers. SIIA would like to point out that this indicates a necessity for buyers to be aware of the possibility that software being sold through such ads might not be legal. The same vigilance that buyers need when buying software from other kinds of online sources should be maintained when contacting text ad sellers.
Documents submitted by the US Attorney state that Peterson made $5.6 million selling pirated software with a total retail price of just under $20 million. U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis accepted Peterson’s guilty plea and is expected to hand down his sentence early next year.
