Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

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qingfeng.xia
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Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by qingfeng.xia »

Hi,

Happy new year 2022, and hope you all safe and this Covid19 will soon disappear.

## The Story

Recent years, some techincally-leading state has banned some entities of some other states from using its industrial software. This situation motivated some clever people to "borrow" open source software into his copyrighted software for greater interest.

I found one commercial company extended FreeCAD substantially into a CAE software. It mentioned the usage of OCCT, QT in acknowledgement, but not FreeCAD. This software compile all python scripts into binary pyd, rename all FreeCAD*.dll/so file names, redraw most icons, stream-encrypting FcStd file format, and disguised into a self-made closed-source commercial software. While, I should knowledge that significant input (government funding and private capital rush in) has given the chance for them to liftup the software decently.

The situation could be complicate so I choose to not disclose the company name at this moment. Proof of license violation has been collected, as the violation is apparent, I did not brother to do quantitative binary similarity study. But that is possible, the software is publicly downloadable (so it is distributed) for free trial after approval (registration and manually approved).

## What shall we do to protect FreeCAD

As FreeCAD is a great work but free of charge. Today I count the code line in the master branch, it is more than 6 million. The value of FreeCAD code-base, is at least 0.x billion US dollar, aligned with the valuation method of Linux kernel. we must protect the code from theft.

`git log --pretty=tformat: --numstat | awk '{ add += $1; subs += $2; loc += $1 - $2 } END { printf "added lines: %s, removed lines: %s, total lines: %s\n", add, subs, loc }';`

>added lines: 16977440, removed lines: 10180656, total lines: 6796784

As I know, "FreeCAD developers" is not a legal entity, to sue anybody? even if we want to enforce LGPL license (Recent news says court in Italy can enforce open source liability), but I am not sure if some contributor like me has the legal stance to claim/or just ask them "Acknowledge FreeCAD developers". Acknowledgement is not enough, the behavior of disguising open source software into a claimed self-developed for greater commercial interest should be clarified/stopped/apologized at least.

Who has the legal knowledge, please suggest.

## What shall we do in the future?

I remembered there was a discussion of FreeCAD community, to form a steering committee (or similar like), or somehow gain commercial support for FreeCAD, it seemed it was voted against. While, I throw out this question again to the three major authors, and other developers. Can we have a mechanism to stop code theft, license violation?

I think FreeCAD is a really generous CAD-CAE platform released as LGPL, even permit "branching" to change App name and splashscreen, but I am sure somewhere the rebranded FreeCAD must show it is a FreeCAD somewhere.

Further, if some company want to use FreeCAD but LGPL is not suitable, can we relicense FreeCAD to let them to do more modification with dual-license option. I heard dual-license was hard to gain all contributors' agreement, but should be possible, given LGPL version will be always available. The relicense fee can be used to employ full-time developers.

## How about extra funding channel?

FreeCAD community has sponsor links: [liberapay.com/**FreeCAD**](https://liberapay.com/FreeCAD) , https://wiki.freecadweb.org/Donate , not sure how good it works.

Blender has multiple giant sponsors. KiCAD has some large institution backup, can FreeCAD forms such an legal entity (charity) to receive company donation, and do some mutual benefit by prioritizing some feature requested? I sense the current situation could be a good chance for FreeCAD community, to gain more support to accelerate the development.

In the CAD field, there are organizations formed, ODA(Open Design Alliance), ITC(IntelliCAD Technology Consortium, to release a common platform-base for some smaller OEM companies to make their own software on top. Does that model apply to FreeCAD?

Qingfeng Xia

2022-01-03
Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 64bit, python3, always work with latest FreeCAD daily build
Working on Cfd module for FreeCAD, FreeCAD_Module_Develop_Guide
https://github.com/ukaea/parallel-preprocessor/
https://github.com/qingfengxia/Cfd
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adrianinsaval
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by adrianinsaval »

that is sad to hear :( there were long forum discussions about organization but apparently nothing came out of it in the end (https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12242)
there was an application sent to one of the organizations proposed https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic. ... 10#p396945 but no news since
drmacro
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by drmacro »

Hmm...I can think of at least six times this has been discussed here in the forums in the not too distant past. Maybe even monthly.
I can think of at least 3 times, in the last month it has been discussed in several social media platforms (that's 3 times, at least, in each platform.)

The thread always starts "can we" or "we should" or "someone should" and includes "Blender Foundation did it", "KiCAD did it".

The list of things that are needed to make it happen is long, nothing to do with CAD (or even software) and includes legal, banking, tax, and organization (managers, directors, accountants, etc.), and more.

So, the answer is, again: Who is going to do it?

Also, I don't see how something that is completely free can be the object of theft. :?:
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: Spock: "...His pattern indicates two-dimensional thinking."
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adrianinsaval
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by adrianinsaval »

drmacro wrote: Mon Jan 03, 2022 6:48 pm Also, I don't see how something that is completely free can be the object of theft. :?:
It's a license violation
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by drmacro »

adrianinsaval wrote: Mon Jan 03, 2022 10:12 pm
drmacro wrote: Mon Jan 03, 2022 6:48 pm Also, I don't see how something that is completely free can be the object of theft. :?:
It's a license violation
TBH, I didn't read the details of exactly what is being described.

I also, don't know the prosecutorial history of the licensing authority. If it has a history of prosecution then it might be some ramifications for the offending organization.

I know of no attempt to prosecute on behalf of FreeCAD. Is there?

The legal point is really moot, with no organization behind FreeCAD.
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: Spock: "...His pattern indicates two-dimensional thinking."
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jonasb
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by jonasb »

drmacro wrote: Mon Jan 03, 2022 10:26 pm The legal point is really moot, with no organization behind FreeCAD.
From my understanding, every copy right holder of FreeCAD's LGPL code could sue the offending company to fulfil the license claims -- that is, give access to their modifications to the source code and what else is needed to build. So the legal point is not moot at all. The validity of (L)GPL has been confirmed more than once by courts all over the world.

However, for most individuals the costs/risks/time of such an endeavour are simply not feasible. So without an organisation stepping in it is just not practical.
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by drmacro »

jonasb wrote: Mon Jan 03, 2022 11:31 pm ...

...

However, for most individuals the costs/risks/time of such an endeavour are simply not feasible. So without an organisation stepping in it is just not practical.
This is why this discussion is moot...not the legal legitimacy of the license. :roll:
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johnwang
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by johnwang »

Only thing can do is let the public to shame the offending company and push them to release the source code or remove lgpl code.
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jonasb
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by jonasb »

drmacro wrote: Tue Jan 04, 2022 12:11 am
jonasb wrote: Mon Jan 03, 2022 11:31 pm ...

However, for most individuals the costs/risks/time of such an endeavour are simply not feasible. So without an organisation stepping in it is just not practical.
This is why this discussion is moot...not the legal legitimacy of the license. :roll:
My bad, sorry for the misunderstanding. So we actually have the same point, then.
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yorik
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Re: Protect FreeCAD from code theft and would a legal entity help?

Post by yorik »

We had several cases like this already, namely HyperBIM and different versions of FreeCAD rebranded and sold on the Windows store. @qingfeng.xia , can you DM me with the details, if possible, if it's possible to have a look?

Basically the LGPL license of FreeCAD, although it permits the use of FreeCAD in commercial applications, doesn't allows to do that just anyhow. The rules are pretty strict. Basically:

1) The app must not REMOVE the freedoms that the LGPL license gives to the users of FreeCAD (use free of charge, look at the source code, modify, distribute). So proprietary applications must take great care when they use LGPL software to still offer these freedoms to the users. Practically, that means the best way is to offer FreeCAD "together" with their software, so their own proprietary license doesn't affect the FreeCAD components. In practice, this is very hard to do, none of them do it, so they are all violating the LGPL.

2) It is very hard to do anything legally. We would need to pay specialized lawyers, and those are international lawsuits. Even with a legal entity, we'd hardly have money and time for this, and it would even be a pity spending so much effort in that instead of working on FreeCAD...

3) That doesn't mean we can't do anything. In the hyperBIM case, the community got extremely vocal on their social networks, and they agreed to look again and relicense their app under LGPL (need to keep watching if that will effectively happen, though). In the Windows Store case, we made a dcma request at Microsoft, arguing the LGPL breach + impersonating (Companies were impersonating us and selling something under their name). This is under reviewing by Microsoft.

4) There are big news coming regarding legal entity. Stay tuned ;)
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