Recently a Delaware man was fined more than $210 000 for selling pirated software va the iOffer online auction service.
The prosecution was made following an investigation by the Business Software Alliance (BSA), acting on behalf of Adobe, Autodesk and Microsoft, whose software was being sold by the man without authorisation from the software vendors.
In a statement, the BSA said that the judgement included $195 000 in statutory damages, with a further $15 563 in legal fees and court costs.
The BSA added that it rarely takes court action against individuals, preferring instead to educate the public about software piracy.
Infosecurity notes that the order against the man - who allegedly sold 200 copies of the downloaded software for between $8.00 and $12.00 a time - dates back to May 2009, but details of the judgement in the Northern California District Court have only just been made public.
According to the IDG newswire, the BSA has made 10 settlements with companies using pirated software since the start of the year, and several more are pending.