A new study recently reviewed that 35 percent of the software installed in 2006 on personal computers worldwide was obtained illegally amounting to nearly US$ 40 billion in global losses due to software piracy. However, progress has been noticed in a number of emerging markets, most notably in china, where the piracy rate dropped ten percentage points in three years, and in Russia , where piracy fell seven percentage points in three years.
These are among the findings of the fourth annual global PC software piracy study released by the Business Software Alliance (BSA), an international association representing the commercial software industry. the study was conducted independently by IDC, the information technology (IT) industry’s leading global market research and forecasting firm.

Piracy Rate By Region

“The good news is we are making progress, however, we still have a lot of work to do to reduce unacceptable levels of piracy,” said BSA president and CEO Robert Holleyman. “These significant losses translate into negative impacts on IT industry employment, revenues, and financial resources available for future innovation and the development of new technologies.” Worldwide, for every two dollars of software purchased legitimately, one dollar was obtained illegally. global losses increased in 2006 by more than US$ 5 billion(15 percent) over the previous year. Of the 102 countries covered in this year’s study, piracy rates dropped moderately in 62 countries, while increasing in 13.