Software piracy passes as any act resulting in stealing legally protected software. The act’s impact on the individual and society increases productivity risks through security holes that cause users to experience glitches and bugs. The outcome of the experience is frustrations, lost times, and lost work (Parson, n.d.). Two, the absence of warranties with the pirated software means they are exposed to increased security risks with the software containing viruses and associated malware that affect computers (Parson, n.d.). Third, the individual or society is exposed to legal risks associated with pirated software when caught using it. Piracy results in economic risks that take away legitimate software sales to the software company. Law-abiding companies are forced to illegally share their work with others (Parson, n.d.). Further, with other companies outside the software industry willing to pirate and save money, software companies run losses amounting to billions of dollars annually.
In the U.S., consumers searching for illegal content have a choice of proliferated platforms enabling them to stream pirated material. As posted on Viaccess.orca, Stout (2021) shows that 23 million from 9 million American households used a pirated IPTV subscription in 2021. Further, pirated video services value from accessed non-Pay-TV and Pay-TV consumers was projected to be more than $67 billion by the end of 2023 (Stout, 2021). To counter this form of piracy, among the most effective ways is removing incentives for users to look for pirated content. The other anti-piracy solutions are PR and education, where piracy is highlighted as a crime, and legal and enforcement, where countermeasures are implemented to remove and interrupt pirated content (Stout, 2021). By mention, the other anti-piracy measures are cooperation, technology and operations, and barrier to entry.