Liability for failings of open source software is a growing business risk for companies using “free” software developed by a collaboration of software programmers who do not in the end own the copyright.
In the event of copyright infringement and of contributor anonymity the end user will not enjoy the same protection to what a closed software programme offers-such as Microsoft- whereby the owner of the IP will offer indemnity if the software ownership or use is challenged by a third party. Microsoft offers unlimited indemnification to its customers, which can be appealing if as an innocent user you can be held to have infringed copyright “without fault”.
Various open source sellers now offer limited indemnification in response and others such as Palamida offer software that checks the software in use at an organisation and reports on possible liability issues.
IP infringement cases can involve significant management time, legal costs, IT risk and brand damage and should be avoided at all cost.
It therefore pays to have your software licences reviewed periodically for evidence of limited or unlimited indemnification together with adequate warranty protection for the licensee.
Here at Business Lawyers we are happy to audit businesses for IP compliance at a fixed annual fee that gives you budget certainty and which can be spread over the financial year by direct debit to make payments easier.
