ACTA - Remember when you thought it was actually about counterfeiting? Yeah, that was a lie.

I'm not entirely sure which countries are going to sign this thing, but those of you not in the US or Canada should go check if you're on the list because there are a lot of them.

Via BoingBoing (since my real source is in legalese)

Quote :

The internet chapter of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, a secret copyright treaty whose text Obama's administration refused to disclose due to "national security" concerns, has leaked. It's bad. It says:

* That ISPs have to proactively police copyright on user-contributed material. This means that it will be impossible to run a service like Flickr or YouTube or Blogger, since hiring enough lawyers to ensure that the mountain of material uploaded every second isn't infringing will exceed any hope of profitability.

* That ISPs have to cut off the Internet access of accused copyright infringers or face liability. This means that your entire family could be denied to the internet -- and hence to civic participation, health information, education, communications, and their means of earning a living -- if one member is accused of copyright infringement, without access to a trial or counsel.

* That the whole world must adopt US-style "notice-and-takedown" rules that require ISPs to remove any material that is accused -- again, without evidence or trial -- of infringing copyright. This has proved a disaster in the US and other countries, where it provides an easy means of censoring material, just by accusing it of infringing copyright.

* Mandatory prohibitions on breaking DRM, even if doing so for a lawful purpose (e.g., to make a work available to disabled people; for archival preservation; because you own the copyrighted work that is locked up with DRM)

Here comes the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement!

Quote :

Despite the efforts to combat leaks, information on the Internet chapter has begun to emerge (just as they did with the other elements of the treaty). [Update 11/6: Source document now posted] Sources say that the draft text, modeled on the U.S.-South Korea free trade agreement, focuses on following five issues:

1. Baseline obligations inspired by Article 41 of the TRIPs which focuses on the enforcement of intellectual property.

2. A requirement to establish third-party liability for copyright infringement.

3. Restrictions on limitations to 3rd party liability (ie. limited safe harbour rules for ISPs). For example, in order for ISPs to qualify for a safe harbour, they would be required establish policies to deter unauthorized storage and transmission of IP infringing content. Provisions are modeled under the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement, namely Article 18.10.30. They include policies to terminate subscribers in appropriate circumstances. Notice-and-takedown, which is not currently the law in Canada nor a requirement under WIPO, would also be an ACTA requirement.

4. Anti-circumvention legislation that establishes a WIPO+ model by adopting both the WIPO Internet Treaties and the language currently found in U.S. free trade agreements that go beyond the WIPO treaty requirements. For example, the U.S.-South Korea free trade agreement specifies the permitted exceptions to anti-circumvention rules. These follow the DMCA model (reverse engineering, computer testing, privacy, etc.) and do not include a fair use/fair dealing exception. Moreover, the free trade agreement clauses also include a requirement to ban the distribution of circumvention devices. The current draft does not include any obligation to ensure interoperability of DRM.

5. Rights Management provisions, also modeled on U.S. free trade treaty language.

Quote :

The Internet chapter raises two additional issues. On the international front, it provides firm confirmation that ACTA is not a counterfeiting treaty, but a copyright treaty. These provisions involve copyright policy as no reasonable definition of counterfeiting would include these kinds of provisions. On the domestic front, it raises serious questions about the Canadian negotiation mandate. Negotiations from Foreign Affairs are typically constrained by either domestic law, a bill before the House of Commons, or the negotiation mandate letter. Since these provisions dramatically exceed current Canadian law and are not found in any bill presently before the House, Canadians should be asking whether the negotiation mandate letter has envisioned such dramatic changes to domestic copyright law. When combined with the other chapters that include statutory damages, search and seizure powers for border guards, anti-camcording rules, and mandatory disclosure of personal information requirements, it is clear that there is no bigger IP issue today than the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement being negotiated behind closed doors this week in Korea.

Well here we go. They kept this secret (because that's the essence of democracy y'know) - Canada (among other countries) might be getting Three Strikes laws. These would be three ACCUSATIONS, with no backup or trial, of copyright infringement and then your internet access is cut off for a year. The reason they were hiding it was because they knew it'd cause a massive uproar, which is apparently exactly what is happening. I'm going to keep my eye out for protests. Except that it's going to be tough to keep it from happening because discussions have been secretly going on for years and a number of other countries have practically signed the thing.

Yes, this is in the US too.

An American take on it

Quote :

This week 40 or so countries are meeting in South Korea to consider text for a new international agreement on the enforcement of intellectual property rights. It is called the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). The term "counterfeiting" is designed to demonize the agreement critics as friends of organized crime, much like the name of the Patriot Act seemed better than the "Elimination of Civil Liberties Act." It is really an agreement that addresses a wide range of intellectual property enforcement issues -- involving patents, copyrights, trademarks and other IPR. (Details here)

If you are a lowly member of the public, the text is secret. The names of persons who attend the meetings are secret. The titles of the documents are secret. If you represent a big firm or law firm -- pretty much any big firm it seems, the U.S. government will show you documents after you sign a non-disclosure agreement - curbing your right to speak out on the contents of the documents you see.

Some details of the negotiation have leaked out, most recently from a memo by Euopean Union describing the Obama Administration proposal for a new global system of Internet controls and liabilities. Michael Geist, Gwen Hienz of EFF, and a few journalists -- most living outside of the U.S., have written about ACTA.

The entire U.S. tech sector has been publicly silent, as the Obama administration has co-oped them into trading silence for access to the secret documents.

At this point, Congress needs to stand up and put an end to this appalling spectacle of secret legislation on a global scale. How can politicians claim to be all for transparency, and allow this indefensible violation of the public right to know proceed?

A large number of organizations and people have written President Obama asking that he end the secrecy of the negotiation. It is doubtful this will happen unless newspapers write about the issue (aren't they big advocates of the right to know?), members of Congress weigh in, or if the critics of the secret negotiation can mobilize public opinion.

There is a lot at stake. Civil rights, privacy, rules for injunctions and damages against businesses and individuals, chilling of speech, the first sale doctrine, the global movement of medicines and other commodities, etc, will all be impacted by this ridiculously secret negotiation.

Earth to politicians -- you work for us, not the International Chamber of Commerce. Make this negotiation public!

This is going to take some serious work to turn around.

This is extremely disturbing.

Wonder if it'll apply to fanficcers, fanartists, and people who put screencaps up on their websites.

I hope all Obama's die-hard fans enjoy the "change" they were promised, cause they're fucking getting it.

Jesus Christ on a motherfucking BIKE.


And Malganis, this isn't even about copyright. It's about government wanting to get its greedy little paws all over the distribution of information and communication. Whether or not your fanfiction will be affected should be the least of your worries.

This will never go through.

But fuck everyone trying to hide it.

Mafiosa wrote:

This will never go through.

You honestly believe that?

Narwhal wrote:

Mafiosa wrote:

This will never go through.

You honestly believe that?

I want to.

It won't if you guys actually show up at protests and write to your local... congressmen? It's congressmen, right?

I'm going to write to my MP.

Crap, Australia looks like it's on the bandwagon too. We've already got some of the strictest copyright protection laws in the world, and our government has been slowly making it illegal to say anything bad about them.

There's no way this can go through - it's too much work, people will lose jobs, and it's just going to end in protest.

They're already pretty damn close to signing it, I'm afraid. I mean, if this hadn't leaked it would have been passed and it's going to take a lot of work to talk them back from it. Don't write this off, please.

Dr. Professor Science wrote:

It won't if you guys actually show up at protests and write to your local... congressmen? It's congressmen, right?

I'm going to write to my MP.

And I'm sure your MP will happily toss your letter into the circular file and fucking forget about it. We have no control over our government anymore, if we ever did. They're going to do whatever the hell they want and ram it down our throats. At least now the US has a chance of beating the UK at the "Who's Doing the Best 1984 Impression" contest.

Narwhal wrote:

Dr. Professor Science wrote:

It won't if you guys actually show up at protests and write to your local... congressmen? It's congressmen, right?

I'm going to write to my MP.

And I'm sure your MP will happily toss your letter into the circular file and fucking forget about it. We have no control over our government anymore, if we ever did. They're going to do whatever the hell they want and ram it down our throats. At least now the US has a chance of beating the UK at the "Who's Doing the Best 1984 Impression" contest.

I don't know, when Canada was going to implement a version of your DMCA, the protests put a kibosh on it.

Fuck this shit, I'm moving to the Moon.

We wouldn't even know about this if it weren't for a goddamn leak. In the US, at least, this was kept from the unwashed masses under the pretense that it was a "national security issue". As in keeping knowledge of our government's Orwellian hijinks secure from the nation.

On a fucked-up lighter note, this is what my friend Chris had to say:

Quote :

Chris
but its a super duper big national security issue!

Chris
ya know, copyrighted material on the internet

Chris
MOVIE BOOTLEGS DID 9/11

I sometimes wonder if that fucking monkey is actively trying to screw up EVERYTHING. Shit like this can't be due to stupidity, he learned to speak English, he isn't THIS stupid. This clusterfuck is a malicious attempt to get the government to control and micromanage everything. Because that narcissistic dick thinks bureaucrats and politicians know what's better for citizens than the citizens themselves in every respect.

Actual national security concerns, like keeping motherfuckers flying planes into shit or The Russians from dropping the bomb, are legitimate reasons to keep some things secret. Keeping people from watching the King Nothing video on YouTube is not a legitimate reason to keep the policing of the internet a secret.

Letters don't solve things like this, protests bordering on riots do.

Also, I'm not sure if Congressmen get a say in the signing of treaties. They probably do, but there's a voice in my head saying it's just the Senate that votes on stuff like that.

No, wrong, bad. 1984 was not a good thing. Argh. I am going to start making phone calls first thing on Monday. Also, this should be posted to every possible place on the web. The more people hear about this, the more people can complain about it.

Any other Canadians here should definitely keep up with Michael Geist. He's a law professor here specializing in copyright law and he pretty much runs the scene on crazy copyright bills. He's awesome. If anyone is organizing a rally, it'll either be him or be passed through him.

Electronic Frontier Foundation

IP Justice

Knowledge Ecology International

Public Knowledge

These are a few organizations that are looking for disclosure of this information.

This whole thing is very disturbing, particularly in that it demands punishment if someone is accused, no proof or due process required. Not only does this violate more than one country's national law, but the potential for abuse is staggering. Anyone can accuse anyone else. Picture, for example, a technologically savvy, butthurt fanbrat coming here and getting IP addresses. Of course, this agreement also does not allow for Fair Use, so it might cut off the on-line sharing of fanfic, fanart, and fan-anything.

One person complaining won't do anything (unless they can give a big bribe or give blowjobs to the right people), but maybe if enough people scream about it, politicians will be forced to listen.

The only people a trade agreement like this one would benefit are the wealthy corporate owners and their political flunkies. This would not have been kept secret unless there was something they wanted to hide. I agree with KelinciHutan on this one...we should post this anywhere on the web we can. The more people who know about it, the better.

Narwhal wrote:

And Malganis, this isn't even about copyright. It's about government wanting to get its greedy little paws all over the distribution of information and communication. Whether or not your fanfiction will be affected should be the least of your worries.

And I totally agree with you. I was just wondering as to what extent and to what inane trivialities the excuse of 'copyright infringement' would be pushed to cover harmless (and very common) activities like fanfic, since Youtube was mentioned in Doc's original post. I have no doubt that it would be used to hide or suppress other, much more important things than fanfic...

Lady Anne wrote:

This whole thing is very disturbing, particularly in that it demands punishment if someone is accused, no proof or due process required. Not only does this violate more than one country's national law, but the potential for abuse is staggering. Anyone can accuse anyone else. Picture, for example, a technologically savvy, butthurt fanbrat coming here and getting IP addresses.

Hell, I was accused of 'copyright violation' by a butthurt fanbrat from ff.net. She contacted LiveJournal and my account was threatened with suspension unless I pulled my post of her fanfic.

Gee, Obama is trying to keep something a secret because he knows that we won't like it if it's actually revealed? What an unprecedented turn of events. :psy-4:

unskilled78 wrote:

Gee, Obama is trying to keep something a secret because he knows that we won't like it if it's actually revealied? What an unprecedented turn of events. :psy-4:

This is bigger than just Obama, Skillet. Pick somewhere else to push your agenda and deal with this problem here and now.

Dr. Professor Science wrote:

unskilled78 wrote:

Gee, Obama is trying to keep something a secret because he knows that we won't like it if it's actually revealied? What an unprecedented turn of events. :psy-4:

This is bigger than just Obama, Skillet. Pick somewhere else to push your agenda and deal with this problem here and now.

:lolinsane:
You're right. I apologize.
Let's start a revolt.

I e-mailed information about this to the 70 members of the mailing list for my fanfic website, urging them to spread the word. I don't know how much good it will do, but I'm sure as hell going to try.

unskilled78 wrote:

Dr. Professor Science wrote:

unskilled78 wrote:

Gee, Obama is trying to keep something a secret because he knows that we won't like it if it's actually revealied? What an unprecedented turn of events. :psy-4:

This is bigger than just Obama, Skillet. Pick somewhere else to push your agenda and deal with this problem here and now.

:lolinsane:
You're right. I apologize.
Let's start a revolt.

You're not sorry. I already corrected you over Skype about this.

I'm going to send a paper letter to my MP on Monday. I'm yelling about it to everyone I talk to regularly and... I don't know... I might put up fliers at my university or something.

What, he's not allowed to be pissed off at Obama for being a deceitful shitbag? I'm fucking furious about it! I'm tired of my country being led by megalomanic assholes and now THIS FUCKER IS TRYING TO TAKE AWAY MY INTERNET.