News Articles

Microsoft takes legal action against Comet for counterfeit CDs

Computing giant Microsoft is suing the UK electrical retailer, Comet for creating and selling pirated recovery discs for Windows XP and Vista.

Most PCs have Windows pre-installed when they are sold and the recovery discs are used to reinstall the Windows operating system onto PCs if needed at a later date. Recently there has been a tendency for the recovery files to be saved onto a partition of the hard drive and so often PCs are sold without a recovery disc.

Comet, however are accused of producing counterfeit recovery discs which they then sold with PCs to customers. All the PCs which Comet sold already had Windows Pre-installed but according to Microsoft they did not have permission to produce the recovery CDs.

David Finn, Microsoft associate general counsel for Worldwide Anti-Piracy and Anti-Counterfeiting at Microsoft said in a statement that the sale of these discs was “unfair” to Comet customers. He added: "Comet produced and sold thousands of counterfeit Windows CDs to unsuspecting customers in the United Kingdom. Comet's actions were unfair to customers. We expect better from retailers of Microsoft products - and our customers deserve better, too,”

Comet released a statement strongly defending the claim and saying: "We note that proceedings have been issued by Microsoft Corporation against Comet relating to the creation of recovery discs by Comet on behalf of its customers.”

"Comet has sought and received legal advice from leading counsel to support its view that the production of recovery discs did not infringe Microsoft's intellectual property.”

At Franklins Solicitors LLP, our Business Services and Litigation teams work closely together to advise both businesses and individuals on all aspects of the protection and enforcement that can be afforded to their branding, creations and ideas from both non-litigious and litigious perspectives. In addition, the Firm's Business Services team can offer sound commercial advice as to the various methods of exploiting IPR including agency, distribution, sponsorship, franchising and other licensing arrangements. As such, the Firm is well placed to provide strategic advice as to the availability of Intellectual Property protection and then how to identify and manage potential infringement.

For more information and help on the law relating to Intellectual Property please contact our Business Services team on 01908 660966 or fill out our online contact form.

• < < Go back to the previous page
• News Homepage