European Privacy Czar Very Worried About ACTA

from the copyright-shouldn't-trump-privacy dept

Fri, Jun 11th 2010 1:14am — Mike Masnick

Michael Scott points us to IPKat's coverage of a report put out by the European Data Protection Supervisor, which is in charge of privacy interests in Europe, about some serious concerns in ACTA. The report actually came out a few months ago, but just recently showed up in the Official Journal of the European Union. The EDPS is quite worried that no one seems to be taking privacy issues into account in the ACTA negotiations -- and, in fact, suggest that privacy issues should have been included from the very beginning. There are also concerns about a variety of individuals rights:

While intellectual property is important to society and must be protected, it should not be placed above individuals' fundamental rights to privacy, data protection, and other rights such as presumption of innocence, effective judicial protection and freedom of expression

Of course, to date, we've seen little, if any concern from ACTA negotiators for any of these things.

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Filed Under: acta, europe, privacy

16 Comments

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sud0ku, 11 Jun 2010 @ 2:30am

Hopefully ACTA is one step closer to being flushed.
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Jun 2010 @ 3:58am

No matter how we spin it, we wont be able to generate enough outrage to affect ACTA at this point.
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Jun 2010 @ 6:54am

Re:
ACTA as written is a double edged sword. It can be used against the Pharma houses, Record Labels, TV, and movie studios to cut a wide swath in their profits. The lack of due process, the ability to shut down web sites via accusation, the lack of basic checks and balances to prevent abuse, the lack of a clear chain of IP ownership (from current copyright law), the ability to use accusations to hold pharmaceuticals at the docks, etc, etc.

example - All things published are now copyrighted. The old way was to have to register it. The lack of any method to verify you are the true owner of a specific piece of IP, and limited legal responses for copyfraud, is one of the great tools for abusing ACTA.

example - different laws in different countries and cross border enforcement of laws. We have already seen this used as both a tool to silence, and as an anticompetative tool.

example - Using the size of corporations to get DMCA takedowns sent against legitimate corporate authorized content. This one has already been done and is very easy.

The example list goes on and on, ACTA amplifies the old and bring forward a whole new set of abuses. The IP maximalists have their wish list in ACTA. The problem is they didnt think through the big unintended consequence, it can be used against them.
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Jun 2010 @ 7:02am

Here is a link to the actual document
Opinion of the European Data Protection Supervisor on the current negotiations by the European Union of an Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA)
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Joel (profile), 11 Jun 2010 @ 7:09am

We are all worried...
Hopefully this guy can stir some people up. I have been worried for a while about this...
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Jun 2010 @ 7:10am

in the end, copyright does not limit peoples free speech, it only limits 'repeated speech' or 'derivative speech'. the presence of copyright doesnt suddenly stop you from talking or expressing yourself. it is a major red herring.
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out_of_the_blue, 11 Jun 2010 @ 7:15am

EDPS may be sincere, but is clueless.
Dang it, don't people GET that the intent of ACTA is arbitrary and sweeping police state powers? Copyright is only the hook. Details don't matter except to provide low-level bureaucrats with busy-work; it's another *overall* increment of tyranny is the salient point. Even the "drawbacks" mentioned above are a *tool* to use on big media, enabling selective enforcement either for or against them.
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Jun 2010 @ 7:45am

oh mike, can you show where the privacy czar said he is *very* worried? i must have missed that.
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Jun 2010 @ 7:48am

Re:
You manage to miss a lot of things. Perhaps it is time to get your eyes checked.
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WammerJammer (profile), 11 Jun 2010 @ 8:07am

More third party work
ACTA is simply more work for the lawyers. Which is one of the 3 professions you can't trust. Police, Politicians (the terrible two) and Lawyers. What I was taught was to avoid those 3 because they lie for a living and can't be trusted.
Anyone prove otherwise??
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Detonate, 11 Jun 2010 @ 8:43am

Re: Re:
It obviously can happen with [overly] long copyright durations, but is more apparent with patents: how does *anyone* manage, even now, to get anything done or brought to market *without* tripping over all of the minefield of who [supposedly] "owns" what?

IP maximalists are so lacking in foresight in their protectionist radicalism that they cannot see how they're merely setting themselves up for a future strangling on their own tripwires.

Disregard for privacy, stealth criminalization, ignorance of the labyrinth of laws they want now...ALL of that affects them too, they are not and will not be immune. What goes for them in one situation will go against them in another, stalling progress and stealing time, stifling markets, killing futures.

They're awfully intent on making a world in which they'll find it terribly difficult to function or survive.
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FUTURE ACTA ENFORCER, 11 Jun 2010 @ 9:45am

Re:
You'll pay. You'll all pay.
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Jun 2010 @ 9:51am

Re:
My right to privacy trumps your fight on piracy. True story.
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Jun 2010 @ 9:54am

Re: Re: Re:
"IP maximalists are so lacking in foresight in their protectionist radicalism that they cannot see how they're merely setting themselves up for a future strangling on their own tripwires."

This is actually something they are counting on. It sets up barriers to competition. (see the contradictory rules line below)

"They're awfully intent on making a world in which they'll find it terribly difficult to function or survive."

Pretty neat though. They are setting themselves up in such a way that they are locked into a specific system. The pharma houses, record labels, TV studios, and movie studios want these elaborately contrived and contradictory rules that prevent competition. The contradictory rules part allows for them to come after you even if you do follow the rules they themselves follow.

This makes them predictable and easy to come at from an oblique or odd angle. From their perspective these rules and laws are there to prevent "Competition". If you change the premiss from "we want to compete with them" to "how do we remove them" or "how do we cause their failure". The rules and laws they worked so hard for no longer apply, and they become an easy target.

Perspective, Premiss, and Procedure.
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Detonate, 11 Jun 2010 @ 10:41am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Heh. They think they're bringing a brave new world from badger holes.

What a tremendous waste, lawsuited money from one hand to another to another til it's back where it started and all the while just circling the drain in the end.

India's taking it to the WIPO:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/06/india-launches-offensive-against-acta-cites -due-process.ars
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Jun 2010 @ 11:02am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"India's taking it to the WIPO:"

Yeah I know china and south america are going to follow suit. Plus you have all these EU commisioners stating ACTA wont work under EU law, 3 stikes, spying by ISP's, data retention, consumer protection, due process. What would be a hoot is if the EU forced a rewrite to meet its Laws and forced it on the US.
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