According to the Business Software Alliance (BSA), New Zealand comes at the fourth lowest spot of software piracy in the world after the United States, Japan and Luxembourg, but is not being awarded with likewise lesser prices for trendy software.

The BSA is an anti-piracy group financed by Microsoft and other big software manufacturers.

The study, by research company IDC, calculated that 43% of software utilized on the world's personal computers last year was plagiarized, more from 41% in 2008, costing the worldwide software industry US$51.4 billion
(NZ$65.1b).

35% to 45% was "legitimately paid for" and the remaining was free or open source.

IDC predicted that in New Zealand 22% of software was unoriginal, unaltered over each of the preceding three years.

In spite of the low piracy rate, consumers are being billed 40% extra for some well-liked Microsoft software. Office productivity set support Microsoft Office Professional 2007 was retailing for $1149 at Noel Leeming and Bond and Bond last week.

The similar software was put up on sale at Amazon. com for US$406 (NZ$568) and at British electronic goods chain, Dixons for 321 (NZ$669).

Office 2007 Home and Student version was last week valued at $249 by Noel Leeming, US$99 (NZ$139) at Amazon and 69.99 (NZ$146) at Dixons, respectively.