This could be the end of reverse engineering in France sadly, I hope it doesn’t have repucussions in other parts of the world.

I think it’s the end of using reverse engineering tools to find flaws in France. Maybe the next step will be to forbid the possession of debuggers and disassemblers.

It’s a valid course of action to reverse engineer software you have bought to make sure it’s secure. If not make your software open source.

Security expert Guillaume Tena, who was last week ordered to pay a fine of 14,300 euros for breach of French copyright law after publishing information about security vulnerabilities in an anti-virus application, has already collected around half the money in donations after appealing for help on his Web site.

On 21 February, Tena lost his appeal in a case involving vendor Tegam and was ordered to pay a fine of 14,300 euros (around AU$23,000) for breaking French copyright laws. Tena appealed for donations on his Web site — to buy a new anti-virus application because asking for donations to pay a fine is also illegal in France — and within a week he has already collected over 8,000 euros.

I say good for him.

Source: Zdnet