Just days after Sen. Hatch's suggestions that copyright holders should be allowed to remotely destroy the PCs of music pirates, a new bill has been introduced in Congress, that will put federal agents in the business of investigating and prosecuting copyright violations. This will also include online swapping of copyrighted works. Our thanks goes to DrJ for submitting this news:
|
The new bill also calls for the Department of Justice to hire agents trained to deal with computer hacking and intellectual-property issues, and it requires the Attorney General, in conjunction with the departments of Education and Commerce, to develop programs to educate the public on copyright issues. A lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation said the bill includes a number of troubling aspects, particularly the blurring of distinctions between official prosecution of criminal acts and civil enforcement of copyright provisions. "It's doing a bunch of things to get the FBI more involved with private enforcement of intellectual-property rights," said Wendy Seltzer, staff attorney for the EFF. "It gives them a chance to scare a lot of users into thinking the government is after them." Seltzer said the provision for ISPs to cooperate with police and copyright holders is particularly troubling from a privacy standpoint. "That would probably authorize them to tell ISPs, 'You also need to give information on users to the RIAA (the Recording Industry Association of America) whenever they ask,'" she said. |
The Recording Industry Association of America has of course applauded the bill. Read the complete article here.
Source: News.com
