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Couple Gets Five Years Jail Time for Illegally Reselling Discounted Windows Software

by Tim Stevens on October 26, 2007 at 11:17 AM

Don't Mess with MicrosoftYou know the discounts Microsoft gives to starving students? The ones priced low enough to encourage students to not illegally download and share things like Windows and Office? Yeah, well, it seems some enterprising businesspeople got the wrong idea and re-sold those copies -- about $29-million worth -- illegally for the full retail price. They've been caught, and the husband and wife team behind the scheme were given five years in prison each, along with $25-million in fines.

According to Infoworld, Mirza Ali, 60, and Sameena Ali, 53, the husband-and-wife owners of Samtech Research, purchased Microsoft software at the academic discount for students, then illegally re-sold it to others at higher prices. The couple funneled profits through sub-corporations, including a construction company run by their son, and apparently wired $300,000 to Pakistan for safe keeping.

The couple was captured as part of a two-year FBI and IRS investigation called "Operation Cyberstorm," making us wonder if federal investigators are fans of old-school strategy games.

From InfoWorld

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Tags: crime, illegal software, IllegalSoftware, Microsoft, Windows

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