Number Of Software Pirates On The Rise

More than half of computer users around the world say they've pirated software, typically by installing more copies of an application than their license permits, or by downloading the software via BitTorrent or other file-sharing networks.

That finding comes by way of a new study commissioned by the Business Software Alliance (BSA) and conducted by Ipsos Public Affairs, which surveyed 15,000 computer users in 33 countries about their software-buying--or alternative forms of procurement--practices. Overall, the commercial value of pirated software was $59 billion in 2010, but rose to $63 billion in 2011, which the BSA says was driven by the majority of PC shipments now going to emerging countries, including China, Russia, India, and Brazil. Notably, those countries have the world's fastest-growing technology markets, but also some of the highest levels of software piracy.

Although 57% of respondents said they've pirated software, according to the study, "frequent software pirates are disproportionately young and male, and they are more than twice as likely to live in an emerging economy as they are to live in a mature one." On average, these emerging-economy pirates also install nearly four times as many applications as "frequent pirates" in more mature economies.

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