In this article, we look at how the risks to businesses posed by pirated software can far outweigh the benefits of using it, and how you can protect your business from the true costs of pirated software.

Benefits 

On the surface, there appears to be some clear benefits to using pirated software such as acquiring the capabilities of possibly expensive and powerful software at little/no cost, getting the up-to-date capabilities of the latest versions plus reaping the commercial advantages, while learning and getting the enjoyment that this can bring. There may also be feelings and thoughts that the price of the legitimate software may have been too high anyway and that the probably wealthy software manufacturer is not going to miss the potential profit it would have made on a few pirated downloads, thereby relieving users of feelings of guilt.

However, the true cost of using pirated software may not simply be calculated in costs saved or profits lost. There are risks and effects that the pirated-software user may not be fully aware of. Here are some examples which help to illustrate those true costs to users and their businesses.

The Risk of Malware 

A recent investigation by Zscale, for example, revealed that threat actors use SEO poisoning to elevate the positions of their mostly .com domain websites in the search engines for key phrases like ‘Adobe Acrobat Pro,’ or ‘7-Data Recovery Suite’. Downloading their pirate software or cracks, keygens, and activators, however, can mean downloading info-stealing malware, such as RedLine Stealer, or RecordBreaker which can steal passwords and payment data. Downloading pirated software can also mean downloading other malware, ransomware, viruses, or adware which can pose a huge security risk for businesses and individual users.

No Support Or Help 

Using pirated software can also mean forfeiting access to essential support and security features for a program such as training, upgrades, customer support, manuals, and bug fixes/patches. This can mean lost time and the associated costs, added frustration and reduced productivity in trying to learn a program. It can also mean lost features and functions / a lack of access to the latest features (making the program less effective) and can pose a security risk. Having no access to upgrades and fixes can also mean that the program is more likely to fail, thereby causing disruption, affecting productivity, and cancelling out the cost benefits of getting a free pirated version.

Copyright Infringement Penalty Risks 

Using or distributing pirated software comes with the risk of some serious penalties for violating copyright law or using unlicensed software. For example, following an investigation by the Business Software Alliance (BSA), an unnamed infrastructure and public services sector organisation paid a record fine of £250,000 for running unlicensed copies of software Adobe, Autodesk, and Microsoft software on hundreds of PCs in several UK locations. In the US, companies or individuals can be fined up to $150,000 in penalties for every instance and could face up to five years in prison for a software piracy felony.

Increased Risk Of Cyber Crime And Data Breaches Going Forward 

Malware downloaded unwittingly as part of a pirated software program could have the kind of backdoors, monitoring, and exploit capabilities that could be operated at a later date, thereby increasing a company’s risk of falling victim to cybercrime and/or data breaches further down the line.

Damage To Reputation And Loss Of Customers Or Suppliers 

If, for example, a business is fined (or if it becomes known that the business has been using pirated software), and thus potentially posing a risk to stakeholder data and systems, this could lead to lost customers, a breakdown in or damage to relationships with suppliers, and reputational damage.

Compliance-Related Issues 

With many more companies now exploring the risks to their own data protection compliance beyond their own company boundaries, i.e. assessing how supplier systems and practices could pose a risk to their own data protection compliance, using pirated software could lose a company business and affect supplier/customer relationships.

Risks Of Disgruntled Employees Reporting The Company To Receive A Reward 

Although it may sound like one of the lesser risks, i.e. a disgruntled employee or whistleblower reporting the use of unlicensed software in a business, they may nevertheless become motivated to do so by revenge and the offer of a reward – even years afterwards. For example, the Business Software Alliance (BSA) says that a reward may be payable if the BSA pursues an investigation and, as a direct result of the information provided by the informant, receives a monetary settlement from the reported organisation. For example, if a company settles for $15,000 – $100,000, the informant can receive $5,000 or, in large cases, if the company settles for $800,001 – $1,000,000, the informant can receive a $50,000 payment!

Individual Job Threat 

For individuals who download and use pirated software at work and/or onto work devices, giving access to work systems, if this contravenes IT and security policies, the individual could face disciplinary action or the threat of losing their job.

How To Protect Your Business From Pirated Software And Its Negative Effects 

Ways that businesses can protect themselves and their employees from the risks of pirated software, unlicensed software, and other potentially dangerous ‘Shadow IT’ software can include:

– Software asset management and monitoring, including keeping track of all license expiration dates, purchasing any licenses to cover compliance gaps, and keeping software updated. This can include conducting audits of all installed software across the organisation, including all devices.

– Educating employees about the risks of software piracy and its legal repercussions.

– Adopting a software and hardware policy that prevents employees from installing software on work devices themselves and procedures that make software administrators responsible instead.

– Keeping a close eye on any BYOD policy, e.g. developing a clear BYOD policy that works for both the business and the employee on permitted and not permitted tasks, services that can be accessed, control limits over devices, enforcement measures and more.

– Limiting access to systems and data to a ‘need to use’ basis, using encryption, and adopting zero-trust access can all help.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

Although using pirated software may seem like a way to save money, the potential costs to the business could far outweigh those cost savings and could create weak points in security that could put the business at constant risk of cyber attacks and more. Malware, adware, and other threats that are downloaded with some pirate software are significant risks to the business as are the potential legal penalties and reputational repercussions of being found to be using pirated and unlicensed software. Businesses, therefore, need to create clear policies and procedures around software and who is responsible for installing it, pay close attention to software asset management and monitoring (including audits), and educating staff about the risks and the rules. Businesses with BYOD, for example, should be especially vigilant. Remote working using only centralised, approved cloud-based apps with restrictions in place can be helpful in reducing the risk, as can adopting zero-trust and other security-focused practices.

Thames Water has said that it wants to work with data centres in its jurisdiction to enable them to use raw water rather than drinking quality water for cooling.

Switching To Raw Rather Than Drinking Quality Water 

Just as the drought has led Thames Water to introduce a hosepipe ban affecting 15 million customers in the southeast (including London and the Thames Valley area), the company is investigating how switching datacentres to raw, non-drinking water could help with supply.

What Is Raw Water? 

Raw water describes untreated water from the environment such as rainwater and ground water (surface water), water from infiltration wells, and water from lakes and rivers.

What’s The Problem With Data Centres? 

At the moment, most data centres rely on water for cooling and use vast amounts of it. In the US, for example, in early 2020 in Red Oak, just south of Dallas, a legal filing indicated that that Google may have needed as much as 1.46 billion gallons of water a year for its data centre in 2021. In the UK, it was reported that a newly proposed data centre in Slough had applied to use 25 litres of drinking water per second (now reduced by using on-site water storage). Not only are data centres huge water users, but they also need substantial amounts of electricity. For example, a recent Greater London Authority’s (GLA) Development Service briefing note (West London electrical capacity constraints) claimed that a rapid influx of server farms along the M4 corridor is causing electricity capacity issues in the London boroughs of Ealing, Hillingdon, and Hounslow. It has also been reported that the electricity needs of these new data centres mean that developers of major housing, commercial, and industrial developments may now have to wait several years to have the developments hooked up to the grid – something which some councils deny. Unfortunately, trying to reduce the amount of water that data centres use may also have the effect of pushing up their electricity requirements even more.

Raw Water May Help 

The “targeted exercise” by Thames Water to focus on data centres with the idea of working with them to help them use raw instead of drinking quality water is, therefore, seen by some as a way to protect supplies at a time of drought and improve the situation in the future when there will be more data centres and probably more climate change heatwaves. Critics, however, have suggested that the data centre industry is being scapegoated and have asked what Thames Water is doing about losing 600 million litres of water a day (nearly a quarter of its daily supplies), e.g. through leaks.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

It would make sense to develop lasting systems for utilising supplies other than drinking water for data centre cooling, particularly with more droughts likely in the future plus the fact more data centres are being built. Water companies, however, also need to work on and invest in their infrastructure and on retaining their supplies (i.e. reducing leaks). It seems, therefore, that a collaborative effort between water companies and data centres could be a helpful approach. Most businesses now rely heavily upon technology and the cloud, particularly with remote working, so solutions to the large water and electricity demands of data centres need to be found soon. Ideas like using two-phase immersion cooling for servers and using data centres submerged beneath the sea (Microsoft) have been tried and other innovative ideas may follow, but the hope for businesses is that scalable, workable solutions will be found soon to avoid costly and damaging outages in future and maintain drinking water supplies.

With the world facing a considerable semiconductor microchip shortage, we take a look at the causes and effects of the shortage plus some potential solutions.

Why Is This Important? 

Microchips are now included in virtually everything from watches to white goods and crucially in larger, high demand, big industry items such as cars. Many products have more than one chip and as the IoT market expands, so does demand for more microchips.

Why The Global Shortage? 

The global shortage of semiconductor microchips has been caused by a ‘perfect storm’ of many factors. These include:

– Car manufacturers are huge users of semiconductors. The COVID-19 pandemic, the associated slump in demand, and 50 percent slump in car sales, however, caused car manufacturers to slim down in manufacturing which, in turn, caused the semiconductor industry to operate at a much-reduced capacity, thereby reducing supply output.

– Microchip producers switched to smartphone, laptop, and tablet chips in response to a surge in demand due to remote working because of the pandemic, thereby disrupting chip markets.

– Manufacturers of semiconductor microchips, which require huge investment in plants over many years, tend to operate with low stock levels to minimise costs. The surge in demand for chips (particularly for cars) coming out of the first COVID lockdowns, therefore meant there were no backup supplies, chip manufacturers would need time to adapt to switch back to car chips, and manufacturers could not meet demand.

– 780 semiconductor manufacturing plants in the US have been closed over the last 20 years whilst production was moved overseas. This left the US with little backup for chips following the COVID years.

– With most chips being manufactured in Taiwan, the US trade war with China during the Trump administration caused supply problems due to sanctions (e.g. US chip firm Xilinx having to stop supplying to China, and Huawei being put on a trade blacklist).

– There was significant under-investment in 8-inch chip manufacturing plants owned by Asian companies. Also, most of the production in Asia is concentrated into the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC) and Samsung, who manufacture on behalf of hundreds of other different chip companies.

– Weather and other events disrupted supply and worsened the global shortage of semiconductor microchips (e.g. droughts in Taiwan – water is needed in chip production), winter storms in February shutting-down the NXP semiconductor plant in Texas, and a fire at the AKM semiconductor plant in Nobeoka, Miyazaki, Japan (October 2020). The AKM factory (owned by Renesas Electronics Corp), for example, accounts for a massive 30 per cent of the global market for the microcontroller units used in cars.

The Impact 

Examples of some of the main impacts caused by the global shortage have been:

– Massive disruption, damage to profits, and job losses in the car industry and in car supply chain businesses. For example, Ford, Toyota, and VW partially mothballed factories and car manufacturers produced fewer of their less profitable vehicles.

– Phone manufacturers have delayed model releases. This has affected the phone companies’ profits and competitiveness and has had a knock-on in phone retail businesses.

– There have been games console shortages, which were compounded by an increase in demand over lockdown. For example, Microsoft faced production challenges with Xbox Series X/S. This also produced a knock-on effect for games console retailers.

– There have been Knock-on effects into the development of 5G networks (e.g. in the UK and US).

– The semiconductor industry is fragmented with many companies having similar, small amounts of market share, with no single company controlling every application. This has meant that manufacturers have been struggling to get all the components and materials for any one system, thereby disrupting production.

Possible Solutions 

The main solution to tackling the global shortage has been for countries to implement the costly and time-consuming measures of setting up their own semiconductor microchip factories to try and guarantee at least some increased level of supply, and to reduce reliance upon countries with whom there may be a difficult relationship.

In July this year, for example, the US Senate voted across party lines to pass the “CHIPS plus” bill which will deliver $52.7 billion for domestic chip manufacturing and research subsidies. It will also mean $2 billion extra for less advanced legacy chips.

Also, US sanctions forced China to start investing heavily in its local tech companies such as Zhaoxin, Huawei, and SMIC to help deal with the shortage.

These developments will take time, and with most of the last year’s output already sold, it is anticipated that the shortage and many of its effects may carry on for this year and longer.

More Concerns 

There are additional concerns over possible semiconductor supply issues such as:

– Most of the world’s semiconductors are produced in factories in Taiwan and South Korea, and with China’s apparent threat to Taiwan, this could affect supply.

– The UK launched an inquiry into the semiconductor industry and the UK government has delayed a decision about whether the UK’s largest producer of semiconductors, Newport Wafer Fab, can be bought by a Chinese-owned manufacturer. This is partly due to worries over the security of chip designs used in UK defence projects.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

For any businesses that require semiconductor microchips for manufacturing, or for business that supply and sell goods and devices that include these chips, the last few years have been precarious with production supply shortages and production delays. The near future still holds uncertainty and potentially damaging disruption and shortages which could continue to impact upon operational decision-making, hit profits, and have a negative impact across supply chains. There are now worries over China’s potential threat to Taiwan and how that would affect supply if the worst happened, but the US has now passed legislation to enable a serious ramping-up of the semiconductor manufacturing industry there, although building the plants will take time. Also, Japan and the EU have recently been investing in and expanding their facilities to try and tackle supply problems. For example, Intel is to spend €33 billion in mainland Europe on semiconductor research and manufacturing, which could (in 5 years) go some way to helping reduce reliance on chip manufacture in Asia, although Intel has also urged the UK to develop a microchip strategy which Intel’s boss says the UK lacks, and which could leave the UK at a disadvantage in chip supply going forward. The near future is, therefore, still uncertain as regards semiconductor supply and how that may affect UK businesses, but it is likely that there will be a few more bumps in the road over the next few years.

Following an experiment by Bristol and Cambridge Universities, Google has announced that it plans to run adverts on YouTube, TikTok, Twitter and Facebook, educating users about how to spot disinformation and misinformation.

‘Pre-Bunking’ Experiment 

The University experiment which led to Google’s decision to run adverts was based on the idea of ‘pre-bunking’ from ‘Inoculation Theory.’

Inoculation Theory suggests that using various forms of communication, people can be persuaded not to be influenced by other arguments or belief systems. Pre-bunking / attitudinal inoculation, which is based upon Inoculation Theory is the idea that giving web users a small dose of what online manipulation and disinformation looks like will help them to spot it and protect themselves from it in the future.

The Experiment 

The experiment involved Google Jigsaw (a part of Google which “explores threats to open societies”) showing 90 second video adverts on YouTube to 5.4 million people. The adverts informed viewers about the misinformation tactics they may encounter on the platform. 22,000 subjects were then surveyed after seeing the videos.

The Results 

The results showed that respondents’ ability to spot disinformation techniques to decide whether to share content had increased, and that they had an increased ability to discern trustworthy from untrustworthy content. Also, it was found that the ‘inoculation’ effect of the videos worked for people with different levels of education, different political views, and different personality types. It was, therefore, concluded that this type of general inoculation could be scaled and could work well against misinformation online.

Concerns 

Although Google plans to go ahead with the adverts, based on the success of the experiment, concerns raised by some tech commentators include:

– Concerns about impartiality, i.e. who decides what the misinformation (incorrect information) and disinformation (deliberately deceptive information) is, whether it is Google, a government, or another influence. Also, pre-bunking can be used for the wrong reasons, e.g. manipulation by certain regimes.

– The recent apparent failure in the US of pre-bunking over the reason for a video being produced by Russia (which never materialised) in the run-up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Pre-bunking also proved to be not entirely successful in stopping fake news about COVID 19.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

Many people (particularly younger age groups) tend to get their news from sources such as social media which tend to be less trusted in terms of factual accuracy and motivations. Social media platforms, however, have found it difficult to stop and remove fake news, hate speech, and other damaging elements from their channels. State-sponsored attempts to influence opinions in recent years, e.g. the US election and UK Brexit referendum plus widescale spreading of misinformation and disinformation about COVID 19, have all shown that this is a real problem online. Poor relationships between the west and Russia and China in recent times, plus Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have also made the risk of fake news and deepfakes being circulated even greater. Although pre-bunking may not have been entirely successful in other cases recently, the results of the recent experiments could indicate that pre-bunking adverts may be one useful tool and tactic among many for tackling misinformation and disinformation online. There will, however, be some people who will view it with suspicion, so it remains to be seen how well it works in practice, although this may be difficult to measure.

French company Alstom has announced a renewable energy world-first by operating a 100 per cent hydrogen train which only emits steam and condensed water while operating with a low level of noise.

Replacing Diesel Trains 

The train called the Coradia iLint, which operates on a route in Bremervörde, Lower Saxony, Germany, is the first of 14 new hydrogen-powered regional trains purchased by LNVG to replace 15 diesel trains with a greener alternative.

The problem with diesel trains in environmental terms is that, although they are relatively low CO2 producers per passenger mile (because they carry multiple passengers per train), each train produces a lot of CO2, Nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and air polluting particles.

How Does The Hydrogen Train Work? 

The completely emission-free and quiet train, developed for use on non-electrified lines, uses new hydrogen and fuel cell technology. The Coradia iLint train also features several innovations such as clean energy conversion, flexible energy storage in batteries, and intelligent management of motive power and available energy.

The train is refuelled daily using hydrogen gas from a facility which has sixty-four 500-bar high-pressure storage tanks with a total capacity of 1,800 kilograms, six hydrogen compressors, and two fuel pumps. The train has a maximum speed of 140 km/h and can run all day one tank of hydrogen with a range of 1000 km.

The Benefits Of Using Hydrogen 

Using hydrogen as the train’s fuel reduces the environmental burden, as one kilogram of hydrogen replaces approximately 4.5 litres of diesel fuel, but with only steam and condensed water as the emissions rather than greenhouse gases and polluting particles.

Award-Winning And Government Funded 

The train, which is the recipient of the 2022 German Sustainability Design Award, was designed by Alstom teams in Salzgitter (Germany), and in Tarbes (France), and was funded by the German government as part of its National Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technology Innovation Programme.

What Does This Mean For Your Organisation? 

Replacing diesel (and petrol) vehicles of all kinds with viable and practical but green alternatives is a priority in reducing global warming. Not only does this train only emit steam and water, which makes it much more environmentally friendly option than a diesel train, but it can travel at high speeds and go all day on just one tank of hydrogen. Also, using hydrogen rather than electric doesn’t put more strain on the electric grid (the train runs on non-electric lines) and create any other CO2 that would be the by-product of creating more energy at the power station. This makes the hydrogen train not just green but comparable in performance terms to diesel trains. It is perhaps not surprising, therefore, that the manufacturers, Alstom, say they’ve received more orders for hydrogen trains in Germany, France, and Italy. The fact that there was significant government funding and help to develop the technology also shows how countries can invest successfully in finding alternatives to much of polluting technology that we still rely upon in our transport networks.