Authoritarianism Watch — Add ACTA to SOPA and PIPA

Push back against ACTA picking up on Twitter.

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is a proposed plurilateral agreement for the purpose of establishing international standards on intellectual property rights enforcement.[1] ACTA would establish a new international legal framework that countries can join on a voluntary basis[2] and would create its own governing body outside existing international institutions such as the World Trade Organization (WTO), the World Intellectual Property Organization(WIPO) or the United Nations.[1][3] Negotiating countries have described it as a response "to the increase in global trade of counterfeit goods and pirated copyright protected works."[2] The scope of ACTA includes counterfeit goods, generic medicines and copyright infringement on the Internet.[4] Groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) oppose ACTA,[5] stating that civil society groups and developing countries were excluded from discussion during ACTA's development in an example of policy laundering.[6] The treaty calls for the creation of an "ACTA committee" to make amendments, for which public or judicial review are not required. Industry representatives may have "consultatory input" to amendments.[7]

Opponents have argued that the treaty will restrict fundamental civil rights, including the freedom of expression and communication privacy.[8] They also criticize ACTA's removal of "legal safeguards that protect Internet Service Providers from liability for the actions of their subscribers" in effect giving ISPs no option but to comply with privacy invasions.[9] According to an analysis by the Free Software Foundation (FSF), ACTA would require that existing ISPs no longer host free software that can access copyrighted media, and DRM protected media would not be legally playable with free software.[10]

Wikipedia