IP Justice: CODE Letter to JURI

August 11, 2003

RE: International Coalition Urges Rejection of European Union's Proposed IP Enforcement Directive

Dear EU JURI Committee Members:

We are an international coalition of civil liberties groups and consumer rights campaigns concerned about the impact on civil liberties, innovation, and competition posed by the European Union's proposed IP Enforcement Directive. The proposal threatens to restrict the free flow of goods and permit giant US companies to limit consumer choice and impose price controls in the Single Market. The proposed Enforcement Directive's scope is overbroad, encompassing any industrial property right, and it creates a legal regime that favors foreign intellectual property owners while ignoring the traditional due process rights of intellectual property defendants in Europe. We urge the Commission to reject the current proposal in favor of measures that provide for the enforcement of intellectual property rights and that also protect the consumer rights of Europeans and promote competition among European businesses.

One of the IP Enforcement proposal's most invasive provisions, Article 9, creates a “Right of Information” that grants intellectual property owners broad subpoena powers to obtain personal information about European citizens. Besides violating consumer privacy rights, this provision unreasonably burdens universities, Internet service providers, and other innocent third-party intermediaries who must respond to massive numbers of subpoenas and turn in customers for prosecution.

Similarly broad subpoena powers found in the controversial US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) are consistently abused by the Recording Industry Association of America to obtain personal information on thousands of users of file-sharing software. We urge the Commission to reject Article 9's “Right of Information” in favor of less burdensome enforcement provisions that respect the privacy rights of European citizens.

We are also particularly troubled by Article 21 of the proposed IP Enforcement Directive, which forbids using, making, importing, and distributing “illegal technical devices” that can circumvent technologies designed to protect any industrial property right. Disregarding the fact that many unauthorized uses of intellectual property are perfectly lawful, Article 21 erodes the public's fair use (fair dealing) and freedom of expression rights by outlawing all technologies, including software, that are capable of bypassing technical restrictions.

Also similar to the US DMCA, the EU IP Enforcement proposal's ban on circumvention devices is so broad that it permits intellectual property owners to extend their monopoly into separate markets, such as players, readers and other interoperable devices. Article 21's ban on technical devices is ripe for abuse by intellectual property owners to prevent competition and stifle innovation in the market for goods and adjacent devices. Article 21 is a misguided attempt to outlaw a broad category of legitimate technologies and should be reformed to protect consumer rights and promote competition policy.

Because of the many threats to Europeans' civil liberties, innovation, and competition posed by the proposed EU IP Enforcement Directive, we respectfully request the rejection of its overbroad provisions at the EUROPARL Committee on Legal Affairs and Internal Market hearing on September 11, 2003 in Brussels.

Cordially,

Associação Nacional para o Software Livre
(National Association for Free Software - ANSOL) ~ Portugal
http://www.ansol.org/ansol.en.html

Association Electronique Libre (ASBL/NGO AEL) ~ Belgium, Luxemburg
http://www.ael.be/

Association Francophone des Utilisateurs de Linux et des Logiciels Libres
(French speaking Linux and Libre Software Users' Association AFUL) ~ France
http://www.aful.org/

Association pour la Promotion et la Recherche en Informatique Libre
(Association for Promotion and Research in Libre Computing - APRIL) ~ France
http://www.april.org

Associazione per la Libertà nella Comunicazione Elettronica Interattiva (ALCEI) ~ Italy
http://www.alcei.it/

Associazione di Diritto Informatico della Svizzera Italiana (ADISI) ~ Switzerland
http://www.adisi.ch

Austrian Association for Internet Users (Verein für Internet-Benutzer Österreichs - VIBE!AT) ~ Austria
https://www.vibe.at/

Bits of Freedom (BoF) ~ The Netherlands
http://www.BoF.nl

Bologna Free Software Forum ~ Italy
http://www.bfsw.it

Campaign for Digital Rights (CDR) ~ United Kingdom
http://ukcdr.org

Chaos Computer Club ~ Germany
http://www.ccc.de

Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR) ~ International
http://www.cpsr.org

Consumer Project on Technology (CPT) ~ United States
http://www.cptech.org