IT inventory and compliance: Check IT List

Tracking IT inventory means more than identifying computers, peripherals, networks, operating systems and applications. There are legal and regulatory reasons for making an IT inventory above and beyond the typical business practices of stock, managing assets, calculating depreciation and calculating investment credits.

Organizations like the Small Business Alliance are funded by big software manufacturers to ensure that business software users maintain complete, current collections of paid-up licenses for the software they use. This ensures that businesses use commercial software that is valid, current and properly documented (as well as ensuring software vendors are getting their due income).

The SBA helps persuade business users to comply by regularly issuing mailings to businesses, indicating the possibility of an on-site audit. Disclosures of audits include software that's in use but not properly licensed or purchased. Failure to comply can result in fines of up to $250,000 per invalid item.

This Check IT List offers tips and tools to help small and medium-sized businesses properly document hardware and software licensing and purchases.

This exercise produces many more benefits than providing IT

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census data and making sure licenses are valid and current. It provides a regular opportunity to enforce disposal of unapproved, unwanted or illegal software, and it helps prevent security problems as well. Though there are costs involved, the benefits of pro-actively curing such potential problems are terrific -- especially when you could be facing $250,000 in fees for each unlicensed or illegal item!

Tools of note

One inexpensive inventory tool is MVPCInfo. It does not need to be installed permanently on the machines it inventories. It runs as soon as a local copy of the MVPCinfo.exe file is executed. Inventory takers can carry around a copy on a floppy, CD or DVD (or download it), and companies can get by with only as many copies of the software as may be in active use at the same time. (In my own small company, which has had as many as 20 PCs, we've had no trouble getting by with just one copy.) It's available for $25 a copy.

Ed Tittel is a full-time freelance writer based in Austin, Texas, who regularly covers Windows, security and markup languages for multiple TechTarget Web sites. He also writes regularly for Tom's Hardware Guide, TechBuilder and Processor Magazine. E-mail Ed at etittel@techtarget.com.

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