Good intentions and a couple big problems.
Kevin Murphy spotted a new bill that, if passed in its current form, would give the U.S. government more powers to shut down domain names used for piracy and counterfeiting.
The Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act would make it easier for the government to shut down sites with pirated movies and music or selling counterfeit goods.
On the surface that doesn’t sound too bad. But there are a couple things that make me wary:
1. In addition to domains with a registrar or registry located in the U.S., the bill enables the government to go after domains in other countries and force them to be blocked in the U.S. (Interestingly, it says nothing of the location of the registrant.)
Why is this a problem? Well, what if Saudi Arabia suddenly passed a bill requiring sites about womens’ rights to be blocked? I suppose China and Iran already has similar rules though.
2. It’s a slippery slope. What exactly is promoting counterfeit goods? I can envision circumstances where this bill is twisted to go after legitimate domain names. In general I’m not a fan of slippery slope arguments. But if this passes, be aware that similar — and perhaps overreaching — bills could follow.
On face value, the result appears no different to how law enforcement operate today (in terms of shutting things down).
I’m not a lawyer, but the difference seems to be in the enforcement component. What this appears to do is seek to effectively bypass registeries that “dont cooperate” with law enforcement.
There is not a single instance where the sausage-fingered half-intellects at the Department of Gimme do not mis-use new power.
“If it means we can do this, then it means we can do that”. There’s no slippery slope. They stampede directly for the absolute brink.
All adult websites are obscene under strict application of federal law. Any site mentioning marijuana, politics, or any other number of subjects is promoting illegal activities.
All it takes is “that guy” in the wrong place of authority.
please dont take this the wrong way but……
why does the U.S think it can police the world when it has so many problems within that need to be addressed? Please clean your house first.
Yet another nail in the coffin and I cant wait for China to sink the U.S Dollar and call in Americas debt seeing that most of the world now welcome Chinese investment and shun the U.S.
but on a serious note:
people copying stuff has been going on since the first thing was made and with domains being cheap and available to nearly everyone i would say that its a total waste of good money when all they need to do is register another domain and within 30 minutes VIOLA! new domain with the same stock.
Epic Fail
(sorry for any offense)
great they’ll just start using IP addresses if they want to pirate stuff 🙂 Doesn’t stop them, just pushes their activities further underground. The goal should be to take power from the govt, not give more.
Another massive failure of ICANN, Verisign, and the Registrars as they pay lip service to security to police themselves has led to the government stepping in. It just isn’t profitable to invest in a more secure internet!
.org implemented DNSSEC; .info, .eu. .biz and .us. When will it be .com/.net’s turn?
@ Louise, ask your registrar when .com and .net will have DNSSEC implemented. I heard its soon from my registrar. Registrars have the responsibility of implementing it as I hear Verisign has given registrars the tools for it to happen. So go apply pressre on your registrar to make it happen. I know I have with mine.
This bill if passed has a dramatic implications IMHO.
IANAL, but when charges are subjective they are often misused to pursue govt’s. hidden agendas.
As I have stated time and time again, domain names are totally unnecessary! IMHO
When I was 10 years old, we didn’t call Grandma on the phone by dialing grandma-matthews.tel, we knew her phone number. And if you couldn’t remember a number, you wrote it down with pencil and paper!
If people really care about visiting a particular website, they should do the same and remember the IP address. On offense intended, but domain names are for the birds!
Chris – no need to apologize for any offense. We Americans have done this to ourselves by asking our federal politicians to do too much for us (e.g., save for retirement, provide for medical care at an old age, etc.) instead of taking care of ourselves or solving these life challenges locally. In the end, these federal entitlement programs will bankrupt the country, China, Japan and Saudi Arabia will sell off their U.S. government debt holdings and sink the dollar, thus lowering the quality of life for all 300 million Americans. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when. The only way to save America for future generations of our kids and grandkids is to privatize Social Security and Medicare. It’s the only way. Oh, and bringing home most or all of our military men and women from the 800+ military installations we maintain around the world at a cost of over $1 trillion per year. All global, imperialist / colonial empires have crashed or shriveled on the vine — all of them. Great Britain, France, Spain, the Romans, etc. The USA promises to be no exception. It’s just a fact. Now the question is, will it happen in our lifetimes, or will we be sticking our kids and grandkids with the unpayable bills and all the misery of living with a highly devalued U.S. dollar backed only by a bankrupt federal government?