The Digital Millennium Copyright Act

[erik_kosberg]

The plot thickens.

[frazzledspice]

I'm a little confused.

The hacker in the Netherlands has discovered a way to pirate digital video and bust the copy protections that are in place.

He isn't planning on doing it for money (maybe he is, but the article doesn't say that.) All he plans on doing is presenting information at conferences and on his website about how people can break through these shields and copy digital video.

He is afraid he will be prosecuted by US authorities who violating the Digital Copyright law.

Unless he actually breaks it himself by making and distributing illegal copies, what law is he breaking? All he is doing is publicizing the fruits of his own intellectual endeavors.

Instead of terrorizing him, they should hire him as a consultant to test out all their write-protection systems so that they can devise more secure ones.

[erik_kosberg]

I’m not a lawyer, but I think that the problem is because of paragraph 2 of section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (H.R.2281):

`(2) No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that--

`(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; ...

If software or the intellectual process of creating software is seen as “technology”, publishing information about how to circumvent a “technological measure” (e.g., cryptographic software) could be construed as illegal under DMCA.

[drmomentum[$]]

Originally posted by frazzledspice
Unless he actually breaks it himself by making and distributing illegal copies, what law is he breaking? All he is doing is publicizing the fruits of his own intellectual endeavors.

Laws like the DMCA start to make it illegal to discuss any technology that could be used to counteract encryption. No longer do you actually have to steal to be prosecuted, nor do you have to have an intention to steal.

So much for intellectual curiosity and the rights of the individual.

-JP

[evmori]

Does this mean thinking about ways to bust code is illegal? I'm not sure I read it that way. It sounds to me like something tangible (other than thought) must be done. It's not a crime to talk about robbing a bank but is a crime to actually do it.

[erik_kosberg]

It doesn’t make it a crime to think about it, but it does appear to make it illegal to publish the information about how one might, even hypothetically, circumvent the cryptography.

It’s perfectly legal to write and to publish in print or on the net instructions for how to build a bomb. Why then should dissemination of instructions for how to circumvent encryption not also be legal?

[evmori]

Is building a bomb illegal? If it's ok to puplish books & posts on the web on how to build a bomb, then I see no problem with publishing code to circumvent security on the web. I'm not for either.