Buyer may have copied Software

wheresmydoshat

hi,

bit of a mistake on my part here, i sold a piece of software which i did not notice wasn't sealed.

it has now been sent back for a refund as the disc is a cd-r. problem is determining where and when there has been foul play.

i have someone that would be able to help but he's away for a few days.

what i thought i'd be able to do is check when the cd-r was burned by going into properties, but no joy.

i also have the serial number of the software in case i can find out whether its been activated.

any ideas ??

frivolous_fay

Surprised the properties don't help you, what date do the files on the disc show?

wheresmydoshat

this is the thing, i can't see any dates anywhere. maybe i'm looking in the wrong place ?

frivolous_fay

Ok, just tried this with a disc.

Stick disc in machine
Open My Computer
Open disc (Cancel autorun if needed, or Right click and Open)
Right click and show properties for any files / folders on the disc.

The Created date should me near the bottom of the window.

wheresmydoshat

aha, thanks.

turns out it was copied last year, so unless the buyer already had a copy this was done by someone else.

frivolous_fay

Ok, have played around a bit more. On a PC it doesn't appear to show when the file was burned, just the date the file was created... so don't take that info as solid

wheresmydoshat

okay, any other ideas ?

wheresmydoshat

there is a "date created" option, which matches up with the file dates

frivolous_fay

You can also view by Details in the CDR contents and look at the date modified, but I have an example disc here with 4 folders, one of which shows a different date to the one I know it was burned on ... although the other 3 show the correct date ...

weegie.geek

The buyer could quite easily have changed the date on their computer before copying the disc.

Also, if they made a clone of the disc, which is the most sensible way to copy a disc as opposed to dragging and dropping the files themselves, the files would have exactly the same details as the original.

Livingthedream

Can I ask on what grounds the buyer wants a Refund?