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Support Grows for Piracy Domain Seizure Bill
A proposed law allowing the U.S. government to shut down access to websites dedicated to the illegal sharing of film, music, software, and other intellectual property was endorsed by some of the country’s largest content companies in a letter to the U.S. Senate. Activision, Disney, EMI, Major League Baseball, the Motion Picture Association of America, NBC Universal, and Time Warner are just a sample of the dozens of companies who signed the letter addressed to Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat and co-sponsor of the bill. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce also endorsed the bill in a similar letter sent to the Senate last month.
The bill, known as the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA), allows the Justice Department to seize an infringing website’s domain name, preventing online users from visiting the site via its domain name, as well as require any credit card company or bank with U.S. operations to cease doing business with the accused pirate. This strategy allows the Justice Department to impede pirate websites which are hosted outside the U.S., where straightforward copyright lawsuits do not always suffice in shutting down the alleged violators. As many of the infringing sites are hosted outside the U.S., the industry group argues in its letter that “the tools (this bill) would provide are essential to helping address these illegal websites and ensuring that the Internet is a safe and vibrant marketplace.”
A website is in danger of having its domain seized if it is “primarily designed” and “has no demonstrable, commercially significant purpose or use other than” to offer or provide access to unauthorized copies of copyrighted works.
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