Gpl-violations.org

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The correct title of this article is gpl-violations.org. The initial letter is shown capitalized due to technical restrictions.

The gpl-violations.org project was founded in 2004 by Harald Welte. According to its website, its goals are to "raise public awareness of the infringing use of free software, and thus putting pressure on the infringers, give users who detect or assume GPL-licensed software is being misused a way to report them to the copyright holders, assist copyright holders in any action against GPL infringing organizations," and to "distribute information on how a commercial entity using GPL licensed software in their products can comply with the license." [1] It has, among other cases, obtained a legal injunction against commercial software company Fortinet, who it alleges have violated the terms of the GPL license.

On September 6, 2006, the gpl-violations.org project prevailed in court litigation against D-Link Germany GmbH regarding D-Link's alleged inappropriate and copyright infringing use of parts of the Linux Operating System Kernel [2]. The judgement [3] finally provided the on-record, legal precedent that the GPL is valid and legally binding, and that it will stand up in court.