Microsoft Files 20 New Piracy Lawsuits
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In its continuing efforts to stop piracy of its software, Microsoft said Tuesday it had filed another twenty lawsuits in nine states. The Redmond company said the lawsuits were filed for various reasons, including the manufacture and distribution of pirated software.
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Microsoft Corp. MSFT.O on Tuesday   announced 20 lawsuits against resellers allegedly engaged in   the distribution of infringing software and software   components.
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft is suing a group of hackers who apparently gained access to the company's proprietary source code, creating a program that wipes media files clean of file-sharing restrictions. The suit, which Microsoft filed last Friday in a district court in Seattle, Washington, gives only a nickname for the ringleader, "viodentia," who is one of 10 "John Does" whom Microsoft believes are responsible for breaking its Windows Media Digital Rights Management (DRM) software. Last month, a program calledÂ FairUse4WM surfacedÂ that removed the DRM (Digital Rights Management) technology from Windows Media 10 and 11 files. Many major download services, such as Napster, use Windows DRM, and its removal would allow the files to be copied without restriction or uploaded to file-sharing networks. Microsoft is suing for copyright infringement, since FairUse4WM uses code from the company's Windows Media software development kit version 9.5, a toolset used by software developers to build applications. Microsoft said the hackers have caused it more than $75,000 in losses. It is seeking a permanent injunction against the defendants and compensation. In a separate document filed with the court, Microsoft said the defendants have gone to substantial lengths to hide their identities. It asked for extra time to issue subpoenas to e-mail service providers, to track down some e-mail addresses linked to the individuals, to help it to identify them. The hackers have proved enduring foes for Microsoft. Soon after FairUse4WM was released, Microsoft issued an update to its DRM software, making the hacking program ineffective. The hackers responded less than a day later by updating FairUse4WM again. Their efforts are unlikely to affect the growth of legitimate download services, however, since content providers are aware that no DRM is unbreakable, analysts said. "I think in the long term it's not going to deal Microsoft any crushing blow, but it's certainly an irritant for them," said Jonathan Arber, research analyst for Ovum in London. Technology companies will have to make it too hard for hackers to break the DRM, a leap that could be difficult considering any update to the DRM technology would still have to be compatible with hardware in the market, said Paul Jackson, principal analyst at Forrester Research. Additionally, frequent software updates tend to alienate users, he said. "Itâs a question of highly determined hackers desperate to prove their moxie, versus a corporation that can't release updates every 10 minutes because that annoys people," Jackson said.
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Microsoft said on Thursday that the company filed seven lawsuits against spammers that have sent sexually explicit emails on the Internet without adhering to federal laws.
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Continuing the war against spam, Microsoft has been suing some more spammers. The company have filed seven lawsuits against individuals for failing to label sexually
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As part of its fight against software piracy, Microsoft has filed lawsuits against eight resellers for allegedly buying and selling fake and used Certificate of Authenticity labels, the company says.
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Microsoft has filed nine new lawsuits against those it says are responsible for spam, including a Web-hosting company that caters to people who send unsolicited e-mail, the software giant said Thursday.
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A group of California cities and  counties on Friday filed a class action lawsuit against  Microsoft Corp. MSFT.O, saying the world's largest software  maker overcharged them for software.
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The international record industry escalated its fight against music piracy Thursday, announcing that it will file hundreds of lawsuits across Europe against individuals and groups it accuses of illegally sharing music through the Internet.    The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, representing record companies tired of losing millions of dollars in revenue, said its affiliates are filing 459 lawsuits in Britain, France, Germany, Denmark, Italy and Austria...
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Microsoft Corp. filed seven lawsuits yesterday against purveyors of sexually explicit commercial e-mail, alleging that they violated federal restrictions on pornographic spam.
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Microsoft on Tuesday issued 10 security advisories â-even of them critical â -ing consumers and businesses to patch 21 new flaws in Windows software products.
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Microsoft (MSFT:Nasdaq - news - research) is being sued by several California cities and counties, which accuse the company of charging inflated prices due to its alleged monopoly control of the PC operating system market.
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By Bill Husted, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution  Sep. 20--For the third time since June, Microsoft has filed lawsuits  against small metro area firms as it attempts to crack down on the sale of  unlicensed or counterfeit versions of its software.
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The Recording Industry Association of America yesterday (Oct. 28) brought a new round of copyright-infringement lawsuits against 750 file sharers, including 25 users on 13 university campuses.
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft on Thursday filed lawsuits against 23 companies in California and Florida, alleging distribution of counterfeit software. The lawsuits were filed in various U.S. District Courts in the two states and seek to halt the distribution of pirated software by the companies named as defendants, Microsoft said. It did not specify whether it will seek damages from these companies. The company is not shy in using its legal department, especially to stop the manufacture and sale of what it alleges are counterfeit or pirated versions of its software. It cited 125 action it has filed against alleged pirates and merchants over the last year in an effort to stop piracy. Earlier this month,Â Microsoft sued spammersÂ that had either sent unsolicited e-mail to users of its Windows Live Hotmail service, or used Hotmail to send spam. Â
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Microsoft on Tuesday issued 10 security advisories - seven of them critical - urging consumers and businesses to patch 21 new flaws in Windows software products.
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The seven major studios filed their first wave of lawsuits aimed at ending Internet piracy. The lawsuits for federal copyright infringement were filed yesterday in several cities, including Denver, New York City, San Francisco and St.