[for immediate distribution]
IPRED: A Hushed Up Directive
The EU parliament in Strasbourg is about to debate the "Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive" (IPRED), which further restricts European law on copyright, patents and other unspecified "intellectual property rights." [1] The directive's rapporteur is French MEP Janelly Fourtou, wife of the head of Vivendi Universal [2], a group of media and telecommunications companies.
The directive was presented by the legal commission for the internal market in January 2003 [3] then further elaborated behind closed doors to be set on an accelerated course for approval, one normally reserved for directives on which there is already unanimous agreement and does not allow for public debate by citizens, political forces and civil rights groups.
The directive proposes to harmonizes national laws and to combat "piracy" [4] based on statistics, analysis and market forecasts provided by the BSA [5] and other content providers that predict the birth of hundreds of thousands of jobs in Europe (paragraph 2.C, page 10 of the directive); to that end it considers equal unintentional illicit copies not made for profit and those made on a large scale for profit -- and authorizes the rights' holders to hire private police to raid a suspect¹s home (Article 11).
An international coalition of civil rights and consumer groups has formed to sound the alarm on the risks of this directive and to try and limit the damages [6], creating a Campaign for an Open Digital Environment that will meet March 8 from 4:30 pm to 6:30 pm in Strasbourg outside the European Parliament.
Participants include IP Justice[8], European Digital Rights (EDRi)[9], Foundation for Information Policy Research (FIPR)[10], Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII)[11] and Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)[12].
The Free Software Foundation Europe has added its voice to the chorus of protests.
"The directive is extremely dangerous and delicate, it was not debated in a democratic manner. We believe that every law involving immaterial output should be closely evaluated by our elected representatives and citizenry to avoid accepting passively the interests of some companies operating in that sector and ignoring the rights of citizens, content producers and independent operators, " said Alessandro Rubini, who writes both free software programs and manuals.
Among the dangers:
- The sweeping breadth of the directive, which covers copyright, patents, trademarks, satellite and cable transmissions, data bases, software etc., does not give a precise definition of "intellectual property," an expression that has different definitions in various countries nullifying the pretense of harmony.
- It puts into discussion civil liberties like privacy, fair use for non-commercial purposes of material under copyright for teaching purposes or research, the legal safe-guards (that cover, for example, the right to be heard in legal proceedings) and the right of self-expression.
- It reinforces the control over use and distribution over technological devices through the imposition of unilateral licenses susceptible to modification or repeal in any moment and for any reason.
- It prohibits the deactivation, neutralization, removal or manipulation of RFID (Radio Frequency ID) devices that transmit information via radio frequencies the location and movements of an individual.
- Use of private police forces paid by media companies to search private homes of those suspected of violating the law. These types of raids were formerly only possible in the UK where the "Anton Piller" measures could be extended to commercial violations. With this directive it would extend to all European citizens.
- An appeal of the Mareva injuction by which it will be possible to freeze bank accounts and property of those suspected of violating the law before they can appear before the authorities investigating the presumed crime.
- The confiscation and destruction of machines and instruments of Internet provides (ISP) based only on the suspicion that their users are violating the law.
For further details and updates on the March 8 protest in Strasbourg:
http://www.ipjustice.org/CODE/
REFERENCES
[1] http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html#IntellectualProperty [2] http://www.vivendiuniversal.com/ [3] http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/it/com/pdf/2003/com2003_0046it01.pdf [4] http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html#Piracy [5] http://global.bsa.org/eupolicy/copyright/index.phtml [6] http://www.ipjustice.org/CODE/release20040302_en.shtml [7] http://www.ipjustice.org/CODE/rally.shtml [8] http://www.ipjustice.org/ [9] http://www.edri.org/ [10] http://www.fipr.org/ [11] http://www.ffii.org/ [12] http://www.eff.org/ [13] http://www.ipjustice.org/CODE/whitepaper.shtml
More information: http://fsfeurope.org/
Italian contacts:
Alessandro Rubini <rubini at fsfeurope.org> Tel: +39 0382 52 95 54 Cel: +39 349 26 89 041
Stefano Maffulli <maffulli at fsfeurope.org> Tel (office): +39 02 34 537 127 Fax (office): +30 02 34 531 282 Cel: +39 347 14 93 733
Further information is available for the press at: