Comment This is a Catch-22 (Score 2, Interesting) 720
As far as I can see, the whole problem is because of the fact that proprietary programs can't be reviewed by anyone. While this may seem totally obvious, the fact remains that if I employ people to write a program, there is no way I can tell whether or not any portions of code are plagiarized until I get a chance to review every ilne of every program written by every company in the world. If a writer steals a paragraph from a book and calls it his own, any literate person can verify whether that is the case or not. But claiming IP theft of closed secret code is stretching credibility when no one can see your closed code.
Apart from that, the liability would naturally fall upon the code bandit himself, not the company who innocently distributed it. For example if Cathy Codequeen stole code from Company X and inserted it into the new version of ssh, her name would be listed on the changelogs and when Company X wanted to sue Company Y for IP infringement, their liability would be zero as would the liability of SuSE or Redhat or whomever was the distributor. They would have to sue the thief, Ms Codequeen.
Apart from that, the liability would naturally fall upon the code bandit himself, not the company who innocently distributed it. For example if Cathy Codequeen stole code from Company X and inserted it into the new version of ssh, her name would be listed on the changelogs and when Company X wanted to sue Company Y for IP infringement, their liability would be zero as would the liability of SuSE or Redhat or whomever was the distributor. They would have to sue the thief, Ms Codequeen.
