[P2P-F] Fwd: [opennetcoalition] The European Commission Wants to Bring Back ACTA Through the Back Door!

[Michel Bauwens]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: La Quadrature du Net <contact at laquadrature.net>
Date: Thu, Jul 3, 2014 at 12:08 PM
Subject: [opennetcoalition] The European Commission Wants to Bring Back
ACTA Through the Back Door!
To: opennetcoalition at laquadrature.net


Themes: COPYRIGHT, EUROPEAN COMMISSION, NON-LEGISLATIVE MEASURES, ACTA,
SOPA, COMMERCIAL SCALE

La Quadrature du Net – For immediate release

Permanent link:
https://www.laquadrature.net/en/the-european-commission-wants-to-bring-back-acta-through-the-back-door


The European Commission Wants to Bring Back ACTA Through the Back Door!



*** Paris, 2 July 2014 — As the current European Commission sees out its
last days following the European elections, it has just published an
“Action Plan to address infringements of intellectual property rights in
the EU” [1] reusing some of the major concepts of the ACTA agreement that
was rejected by the European Parliament in 2012 following an important
citizen mobilisation. Its contents are also inspired by proposals pushed by
France at the European level [2], letting fear an increased implication of
technical intermediaries in the enforcement of copyright and their
progressive transformation into a private copyright police force. ***

By reusing the objective of fighting against “commercial scale”
counterfeiting, the Commission has chosen to reactivate one of the worst
mechanisms [3] of the anti-counterfeiting agreement ACTA. This vague
expression threatens to include non-commercial online sharing activities
and introduces the same legal uncertainty which was at the heart of the
citizen mobilisation against ACTA, right up to its final rejection by the
elected representatives of the Parliament.

The same commissioners who pushed ACTA, Karel de Gucht and Michel Barnier,
now seem to be considering bypassing the European Parliament to implement
this fight against “commercial scale” counterfeiting. They are in fact
planning to introduce “non-legislative measures” implying the signature of
simple agreements between representatives of the cultural industries and
technical providers, like advertising agencies and online payment services.

These measures are directly inspired from the May 2013 Lescure [4] Report
and from the Imbert-Quaretta Report [5] recently published in France, which
La Quadrature has already denounced as potentially leading to an
exra-judicial application of copyright law, converting these intermediaries
in a private copyright law police force [6]. The Commission wishes that
such a system be generalized in the European Union through “Memoranda of
Understanding”, providing a framework for contractual agreements negociated
by private players.

Such methods will lead to the bypass of democratic procedures of control.
But the Commission also proposes to reinforce the protection of
intellectual property at an international level with multilateral
negociations [7]. Such statements give good reason to fear that, once
again, as with the ACTA [8] agreement, or as foreseen for the CETA [9] and
TAFTA [10] agreements, “intellectual property” questions will be treated in
an opaque way during free trade agreements, leaving elected representatives
with hardly any leeway.

These announcements are all the more shocking given that the Commission
launched at the end of 2013 a public consultation [11] on the evolution of
copyright in the European Union. An unprecedented number of responses
showed the interest European citizens have regading this issue. But
disregarding civil society, the Commission has decided to publish its plan
to fight counterfeiting before the publishing the White Paper it had
committed to work on following the consultation. A number of leaks
[12] concerning this White Paper have already shown that, in any case, the
Commission is only considering mere cosmetic reforms, while recommending
still more extra-judicial measures.

La Quadrature du Net denounces the behavior of this Commission, a
Commission largely discredited by its support of ACTA and which still
ignores the lesson taught the hard way by the Parliament's clear refusal in
2012. The future Commission must reject this repressive and anti-democratic
approach in order to study the possibility of a positive reform of
copyright [13] at last.

“The European Commission seems to think that European citizens, whose
mobilisation led to the rejection of the ACTA agreement, have no memory.
But the same causes have the same effects, and the European civil society
will again reject this dangerous vision copyright enforcement” concluded
Lionel Maurel, cofounder of the association La Quadrature du Net.




* References *

1. http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-14-760_en.htm

2. See the Mireille Imbert-Quaretta report:
https://www.laquadrature.net/en/node/8241/ [fr]

3.
https://www.laquadrature.net/en/acta-updated-analysis-of-the-final-version

4.
https://www.laquadrature.net/en/copyright-in-france-wishful-thinking-and-real-dangers

5. https://www.laquadrature.net/en/node/8241 [fr]

6. https://www.laquadrature.net/en/node/8246 [fr]

7. http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/accessing-markets/intellectual-property/

8. https://www.laquadrature.net/en/ACTA

9. https://www.laquadrature.net/en/CETA

10. https://www.laquadrature.net/en/TAFTA

11.
https://www.laquadrature.net/en/european-commission-public-consultation-on-copyright-la-quadrature-du-nets-answer

12.
http://ipkitten.blogspot.fr/2014/06/super-kat-exclusive-heres-commissions.html

13.
https://www.laquadrature.net/en/elements-for-the-reform-of-copyright-and-related-cultural-policies




** About La Quadrature du Net **


La Quadrature du Net is an advocacy group that defends the rights and
freedoms of citizens on the Internet. More specifically, it advocates for
the adaptation of French and European legislations to respect the founding
principles of the Internet, most notably the free circulation of knowledge.

In addition to its advocacy work, the group also aims to foster a better
understanding of legislative processes among citizens. Through specific and
pertinent information and tools, La Quadrature du Net hopes to encourage
citizens' participation in the public debate on rights and freedoms in the
digital age.

La Quadrature du Net is supported by French, European and international
NGOs including the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Open Society
Institute and Privacy International.

List of supporting organisations:
https://www.laquadrature.net/en/they-support-la-quadrature-du-net




** Press contact and press room **

contact at laquadrature.net, +33 (0) 972 294 426

https://www.laquadrature.net/en/press-room




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