The UK is in its early steps of developing such policy/laws - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11845961 What seems to be happening is that criminal activities and IP enforcement become conceptually blurred, which allows for such actions to be legitimized and validated. What I think will happen is that we will start seeing more criminal laws get amended to include IP issues (rather the other way around) under a general context which will provide a catch all environment for Internet-related activity. Through this, it will also make more sense for law enforcement agencies to get actively involved without concerns over separation of powers or legitimacy. KK Dr. Konstantinos Komaitis, Law Lecturer, Director of Postgraduate Instructional Courses Director of LLM Information Technology and Telecommunications Law University of Strathclyde, The Law School, Graham Hills building, 50 George Street, Glasgow G1 1BA UK tel: +44 (0)141 548 4306 http://www.routledgemedia.com/books/The-Current-State-of-Domain-Name-Regulation-isbn9780415477765 Selected publications: http://hq.ssrn.com/submissions/MyPapers.cfm?partid=501038 Website: www.komaitis.org From: NCSG-NCUC [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Marc Rotenberg Sent: Monday, November 29, 2010 12:09 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: U.S. Government Seizes BitTorrent Search Engine Domain and More More news today. (I had a hunch that the Dept of Justice would be involved.) Marc Rotenberg EPIC -------- From: Morning Tech <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> Subject: POLITICO's Morning Tech, presented by Washington's NewsChannel 8: Today: DOJ discusses IP enforcement - NetCoalition opposing Comcast-NBC merger - Fmr. Pres. George W. Bush heads to FB for live book chat - The privacy debate returns Date: November 29, 2010 5:20:38 AM EST DRIVING THE DAY: DOJ DETAILS IP ENFORCEMENT - U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and ICE Director John Morton are holding a press conference this morning at DOJ where the two will announce "an intellectual property enforcement action," according to the release. This comes on the heels of ICE seizing the Web addresses of several file-sharing websites late last week - more on that below. ICE officials declined to comment on the websites that were taken down. ICYMI: U.S. CRACKS DOWN ON PIRACY HAVENS - From the NYT: "In what appears to be the latest phase of a far-reaching federal crackdown on online piracy of music and movies, the Web addresses of a number of sites that facilitate illegal file-sharing were seized this week by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a division of the Department of Homeland Security. ... The new seizures also come as a new bill, the Combating Online Infringements and Counterfeits Act, is making its way through Congress. The bill, which was approved by a Senate committee last week, would allow the government to shut down sites that are 'dedicated to infringing activities.'" MORE: http://nyti.ms/dOTbmb On Nov 28, 2010, at 11:17 AM, Milton L Mueller wrote: Exactly, DHS consolidated functions that used to be in separate departments (Customs, INS) -----Original Message----- From: Marc Rotenberg [mailto:[log in to unmask]] Sent: Sunday, November 28, 2010 11:09 AM To: Milton L Mueller Cc: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> Subject: Re: U.S. Government Seizes BitTorrent Search Engine Domain and More As a US lawyer, it seems odd to me that the DHS would have this role. International law enforcement matters are routinely coordinated by the Dept. of Justice. ICE is a relatively recent creation, gathering powers that traditionally resided with Customs and the INS. Marc. On Nov 28, 2010, at 10:56 AM, Milton L Mueller wrote: Not so odd, Marc, because Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is part of DHS. Customs would be the primary agency involved in transnational counterfeiting enforcement actions. Recall ACTA and related negotiations. Interesting that this can go on without COICA. -----Original Message----- From: NCSG-NCUC [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Marc Rotenberg Sent: Saturday, November 27, 2010 8:26 AM To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> Subject: Re: [NCSG-NCUC-DISCUSS] U.S. Government Seizes BitTorrent Search Engine Domain and More According to the New York York Times, it was the Dept of Homeland Security (the same agency that brought us airport body scanners) that seized the BitTorrent site and others. This seems odd since it is the US Dept of Justice that would typically investigate copyright matters. Note also that this action took place prior to Senate action on COICA. Marc Rotenberg EPIC ----------------------------- http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/27/technology/27torrent.html U.S. Shuts Down Web Sites in Piracy Crackdown By BEN SISARIO Published: November 26, 2010 In what appears to be the latest phase of a far-reaching federal crackdown on online piracy of music and movies, the Web addresses of a number of sites that facilitate illegal file-sharing were seized this week by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a division of the Department of Homeland Security. By Friday morning, visiting the addresses of a handful of sites that either hosted unauthorized copies of films and music or allowed users to search for them elsewhere on the Internet produced a notice that said, in part: "This domain name has been seized by ICE - Homeland Security Investigations, pursuant to a seizure warrant issued by a United States District Court." * * * On Nov 27, 2010, at 1:57 AM, Alex Gakuru wrote: Does this mean *all* search engines with links will be shut down anytime, including 'Big G'? On 11/27/10, Alex Gakuru <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote: Why complained earlier on expectations that cash strapped ccTLDs especially in Africa/developing cannot afford parallel servers, databases and time costs to enforce third parties IP/copyrights/trademark etc interests. It somehow 'feels' safer NOT to register a .com now? On Sat, Nov 27, 2010 at 7:34 AM, Robin Gross <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote: The latest info that I've seen is that Verisign assigned new DNS servers at the Registry level, and then locked the domain so that even the Registrar can't update it. So now it looks like it may have been VeriSign who "seized" them. No word on ICANN's role in this situation, if any. On Nov 26, 2010, at 8:29 PM, Marc Perkel wrote: So was it ICANN that actually did the seizing? On 11/26/2010 7:25 PM, Michael Haffely wrote: The concerning part about the report from today is that the domain owner never received any complaint or due process before the domains were seized. It appears that no Cease and Desist, warrant, suit, or other criminal complaint was brought up before the domain was taken. What if (for an example) this behavior is taken up by the Patent and Copyright "trolls". What happens to an individual/nonprofit/organization when they have their domain yanked out from under them? If ICANN is to seize domains from their rightful owners by demand of a law enforcement agency we need to have a clear, *rapid* appeals process to prevent abuse by corporations, law enforcement agencies, and governments. -Mike H. On Fri, Nov 26, 2010 at 8:46 PM, Andrew A. Adams <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote: Very similar moves are happening in the UK, with Nominet (UK non- profit with the .uk (and .gb) country-code delegation) engaging with the UK's SOCA (Serious and Organised Crime Agency *) to remove 1200 "sites engaged in selling counterfeit goods" recently and now doing a more explicit deal with the police to take down the DNS registration for sites "alleged to be involved in criminal activity". http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/25/nominet_crime/ (*) The SOCA is a rather dodgy organisation, IMHO. When it was set up the then home secrewtary made a big thing of it not being actually police and therefore not bound by the requirements that the police have to respect the human rights of citizens. THat's a recipe for a secret police operating extra-judicially and here we see exactly that kind of approach. I am very worried by these kinds of moves. Zittrain's "The Future of the Internet" and Mueller's "Networks and States" concerns about censorship becoming the norm not the exception online seem to be coming true. While I'm not in favour of criminals having free reign, the trouble is that all the hard won freedoms such as due process, balance of rights, etc. seem to be being thrown out in the digital domain. -- Professor Andrew A Adams [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> Professor at Graduate School of Business Administration, and Deputy Director of the Centre for Business Information Ethics Meiji University, Tokyo, Japan http://www.a-cubed.info/ IP JUSTICE Robin Gross, Executive Director 1192 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA 94117 USA p: +1-415-553-6261 f: +1-415-462-6451 w: http://www.ipjustice.org e: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> -- regards, Alex Gakuru http://www.mwenyeji.com Hosting, surprise yourself! -- regards, Alex Gakuru http://www.mwenyeji.com Hosting, surprise yourself!