A Microsoft Corp official warned Congress that some of the billions in profits from software piracy are helping terrorists such as Osama bin Laden.
Eight of the 10 countries with the highest rates of business software piracy have connections with bin Laden's al-Qaeda organization, Jeff Raikes, Microsoft vice president for productivity and business services, told the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Raikes urged Congress to attack intellectual property theft, saying that such activity costs US businesses billions while helping fund the terrorist groups that seek to harm Americans.
"In effect here you have a double whammy," Raikes said.
Software piracy costs the US$12 billion a year in company revenue, US$1.6 billion in taxes and tens of thousands of jobs, he said.
"It's even beyond this stealing for money, it's stealing for terrorism," said Senator Gordon Smith, an Oregon Republican.
Countries with the highest software piracy rates include Russia, China, Vietnam, Indonesia, Lebanon, Oman, Bahrain, Bolivia, El Salvador and Paraguay, according to a study by a group called the Software and Information Industry Association and the Business Software Alliance.
Raikes said that rapidly evolving communications technology is leaving both US companies and policy makers with few good options for stemming the losses.
In the wake of the copyright infringement case against Napster Inc, an online repository of free music, two new Web-based systems, Morpheus and Kazaa, are facilitating the sharing of movies and television programs, said Hillary Rosen, president of the Recording Industry Association of America.
"That is what is going on right now and it's going on every day and multiplying," said Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Association of America.
Deputy US Trade Representative Peter Allgeier told the committee the Bush administration is including demands for increased piracy enforcement when it negotiates trade agreements.
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