SOFTLIFTING

Ever heard of “softlifting” – or, “softloading”? Congratulations if those terms are unfamiliar – means you haven’t been sued by a software house for illegally duplicating their intellectual property ---- at least not yet you haven’t.

Softlifting and softloading is legalese for software piracy; it’s sharing a program with someone who is not authorized by the license agreement to use it -- on individual workstations or remotely accessed from a central server. To add new users the proper protocol is to get sufficient licenses ahead of time -- standard practice for operating systems, core processors, etc. – the “big” stuff, so to speak.

Where things get sticky is with the little supporting adjunct packages. They are all necessary but during set up routines don’t command the same attention. So, it winds up being a copy and paste operation and – “Hey, we’ll just clean up the mess later.” Trouble is, clean up gets shoved down the “2-DO” list, and never addressed.

Now, all it takes is some greedy little whistle blower to tip off the right law firm (and there are plenty of them out there) – and you are toast -- burnt toast! You can’t suppose that employees who work your system all day long won’t know exactly which pieces are not in compliance. And, as if you didn’t already know, law firms who specialize in these matters are heavy duty. They don’t think twice about a couple 100 thousand in finder’s fees to get some low level staffer to rat you out.

This is why you need to get the best automated Software Asset Management (SAM) package you can find. It is key and critical to the continued uninterrupted successful operation of your business. You can start here: Capterra They compare SAM products with reviews, installed or web-based, and there is a search for features utility.

Next installment – How, Why and How Much