The mail server used by the largest Russian companies and departments may turn out to be pirated. The UK opened a criminal case against Alexander Malyshev, head of StalkerSoft, a company that develops and sells the CommuniGate Pro communication platform.
According to Izvestia’s interlocutor from law enforcement agencies, in January-August 2018, StalkerSoft JSC illegally sold counterfeit copies of CommuniGate Pro without the knowledge of the copyright holder – programmer Vladimir Butenko. The total amount of transactions exceeded one million rubles.
As Izvestia was informed at StalkerSoft, at the beginning of 2022 the CommuniGate Pro system has about 150 million users. Among them are such departments as the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the General Prosecutor’s Office, the largest Russian enterprises of the defense complex, Russian Railways and other structures.
The company does not admit to allegations of copyright infringement. According to StalkerSoft, the criminal prosecution was initiated by Anna Butenko, the heiress of Vladimir Butenko, who died on August 29, 2018.
“At the beginning of 2021, at the request of Anna Butenko, the Ministry of Internal Affairs authorities for the North-West Administrative District conducted a pre-investigation check against the managers and programmers of StalkerSoft JSC for violation of copyright and related rights. Based on the results of the check, the applicant was refused to initiate a criminal case. Almost immediately Anna Butenko turned to the Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee of Russia for the North-West Administrative District, which opened a criminal case under Art. 146 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. An investigation is underway, but all complaints and petitions of StalkerSoft JSC are rejected or ignored, “the newspaper’s interlocutors said.
The president of the anti-piracy association “Russian Shield” Yuri Zlobin believes that the buyers of the product should not have any problems.
“They are conscientious buyers. The money that they transferred to StalkerSoft should have been intended, among other things, for the author of the software. And if the company has not settled with the copyright owner, there is no fault of the buyers, ”the expert says.
FBK Legal lawyer and patent attorney Nikolai Uzhegov argues that the company’s lack of rights to the software may become the basis for bringing buyers to justice.
“It could even be criminal if the pirated program was used to generate income, causing significant damage to the copyright holder. In most cases, the courts are skeptical about the buyers’ arguments that they did not know about the counterfeit nature of the products they buy, ”Nikolai Uzhegov noted.
Details are in the Izvestia investigation:
“Software discord: software vendor for many departments is suspected of piracy”
Source: IZ
Jane Stock is a technology author, who has written for 24 Hours World. She writes about the latest in technology news and trends, and is always on the lookout for new and innovative ways to improve his audience’s experience.
