licensing software privacy
Can employee be restricted using his or her BYOA or BYOL by employer?
<p>Can employee be restricted to use his or her BYOA(Bring Your Own Application) or BYOL(Bring Your Own License) by employer?</p>

<p>I recently buy 1 per seat license of diff application from <a href="http://www.scootersoftware.com/" rel="nofollow">scootersoftware</a>. They said I can use this application in my home PC and my company's PC etc as long as I'm the only user who use my license.</p>

<p>And I said that I want to use this application to quickly get my work done to my company(my employer). But my company said that you can't use your license in this company because this license is not bought by this company. And strange thing is that the application is used in another section of my company. So the problem is not the application security matter. My boss said it seems my company don't want manage individual license. Should I obey them from this reason?</p>

<p>I believe scootersoftware is the only company that can say such a things. From my view, my company behave as they have monopoly license. But in fact they only bought a few dozens of per seat license.</p>

<p>Does my company violate scootersoftware's right? Or am I missing something?</p>

<p>For a large organization, software licensing compliance is a very broad and intractable problem. The licensing environment is very different for the big company than it is for little tiny you.  Many large companies are subject to audits by software vendors (i.e. Adobe, Oracle, etc.) in which they have to show licenses purchased for each active seat.  There's a whole new INDUSTRY around maintaining license compliance. An employee bringing in their own software and installing it on a company computer complicates this vastly.</p>

<p>That is the environment that the question should be considered within.  The large company makes the decision somewhere along the way that your individual efficiency in performing your individual tasks is less important than maintaining auditable software licensing compliance.  Since they own the computer/laptop/server, it's their decision.</p>

<p>Many times it seems that corporate policies as they apply to the individual worker are obstructive and limiting, but there's a bigger picture to the situation.</p>

<p>Essentially, if you are licensed to use the software in a certain manner, then you are entitled to do so. However, the company that employs you may have employment policies that prevent you from doing so.</p>

<p>In this case, you may be bound by the employment policies and/or contract, which you should probably comply with, in order to avoid breaching that contract.</p>

<p>There may be other reasons why the company forbids you from using a single-user license - if there's any kind of desktop virtualisation, for example. However, you'd need to be a lot more specific about your environment.</p>
