You wouldn't steal a font: Famous anti-piracy campaign may have used pirated typeface

28 April 2025, 09:35 | Updated: 28 April 2025, 13:59

A famous anti-piracy campaign from the early 2000s is in the spotlight after it appeared the font used in the adverts was pirated.

The dramatic campaign compared pirating films to stealing cars, handbags and televisions, telling viewers: "You wouldn't steal a car". It appeared in cinemas and on DVDs around the world from 2004.

But now, social media users have discovered the font used in the campaign was pirated from a typeface created by designer Just van Rossum.

Bluesky user Rib extracted the fonts used in one of the campaign's old PDFs and discovered the pirated font Xband-Rough was used instead of Mr van Rossum's licensed font FF Confidential.

Sky News was able to replicate this process and found the same results.

There's no evidence to suggest that the campaign's designers were aware that the font was pirated, as copies of it were being widely shared at the time.

The creator of the original font doesn't seem too worried, however. He told tech newsite TorrentFreak:

"I knew my font was used for the campaign and that a pirated clone named XBand-Rough existed.

"I did not know that the campaign used XBand-Rough and not FF Confidential, though. So this fact is new to me, and I find it hilarious."

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The adverts became a piece of pop culture history, with spoofs spawned for years afterwards.

In fact, if you try to go to the campaign's official URL, you will be redirected to the most famous spoof, a sketch in the sitcom IT Crowd.

Sky News contacted the organisations behind the adverts, the UK's anti-piracy agency FACT, America's Motion Picture Association and the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore.

FACT declined to comment, saying the campaign pre-dated anyone working at the organisation.

The other two organisations did not immediately comment.

(c) Sky News 2025: You wouldn't steal a font: Famous anti-piracy campaign may have used pirated typeface