Citizens Offered Up to $1 Million to Bust Software Pirates

When you were a kid, you may have heard that nobody likes a tattletale. That isn’t true. BSA The Software Alliance loves tattletales.

If you report software piracy to BSA and your information directly results in a legal settlement between the alliance and the offending party, you can get a significant cut of that settlement. BSA advocates for the software industry, and some of its members include tech giants like Adobe, Apple and Microsoft. It encourages people to report companies using unlicensed versions of software, incentivizing these reports with the possibility of getting thousands of dollars in return.

No Piracy, the BSA initiative to compel reports of unlicensed software use, markets the program as a way for people to get extra cash and even pay off debt. A No Piracy post to Facebook on March 3 reads, “Looking to pay off your credit card debt? If you know a company using unlicensed business software, file a report today to be eligible for a cash reward.” In fact, most of the No Piracy Facebook posts from the past few months appeal to consumers’ need for “extra cash,” whether it be for holiday gifts, a vacation or spending money.

BSA receives about 2,500 reports in the U.S. each year, said Roger Correa, BSA’s director of program coordination for the Americas. Only about 40% of informants request a reward. Last year, BSA awarded about $250,000 total, the smallest award being about $500 and the largest about $22,000.

A report has to meet certain terms and conditions in order to be eligible for a reward. BSA defines piracy as when a company or organization “installs unlicensed software on computers that it owns or leases for its employees to use in their work.”

Because payment is contingent on BSA reaching a settlement with the company, it may take several months to receive a reward, and there’s no guarantee you’ll get anything:

“The decision to pay a reward based on your report and the amount of that award shall be within BSA’s sole discretion. A reward may be payable only if BSA pursues an investigation and, as a direct result of the information provided by you, receives a monetary settlement from the reported organization,” the No Piracy terms and conditions read. Correa said BSA needs to get at least $10,000 in settlement revenue to be able to give a reward, and it takes an average of 6 months from report to payout in the U.S.

“It’s not fast cash,” he said. “These are very thorough investigations.”

While reporting piracy may not be your ticket out of debt, it’s a strategy you can consider if you happen to know about a company using unlicensed software. The online report form says all complainant information is kept confidential.

Should your anti-piracy fight not result in a windfall (the commission is determined on a sliding scale up to $1 million, depending on the settlement amount), you’ll have to figure out how to face your debt somehow. There are many strategies, but the most important thing is to start tackling the debt as soon as possible, avoid adding to it and keep it from growing.

The lifetime cost of debt is staggering, especially if you have bad credit. You can see where your credit scores stand for free on Credit.com.