Digital Millennium Copyright Act

(D-M-C-A)

A change to title 17, United States Code, to implement the World Intellectual Property Organization Copyright Treaty and Performances and Phonograms Treaty (and for other purposes). Among other things, the DMCA makes some software hacking a Federal crime. It does allow, however, hacking for the purposes of interoperability. It also makes it a crime to publish anything that is designed to break copyright protection. It should keep lawyers busy for years.

As but one example, Section 512 requires that hosting and search providers take down content and links to content to be exempt from copyright lawsuits. No review is necessary; just the notice. Researchers have found that quite a number of these notices have been filed by competitors against one another showing but one of the odd side effects of the DMCA. A site called Chilling Effects Clearinghouse, run by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, University of San Francisco, University of Maine, George Washington School of Law, and Santa Clara University School of Law clinics documents such notices and provides templates for response.

More Information

• Copy of Act
• Chilling Effects Clearinghouse