ARCHIVED — Kjetil Kjernsmo
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COPYRIGHT REFORM PROCESS
SUBMISSIONS RECEIVED REGARDING THE CONSULTATION PAPERS
Documents received have been posted in the official language in which they were submitted. All are posted as received by the departments, however all address information has been removed.
Submission from Kjetil Kjernsmoreceived on September 10, 2001 via e-mail
Subject: Consultation Paper on Digital Copyright Issues
Dear Sirs,I write as a citizen of Norway, Europe to express my concern over the Consultation Paper on Digital Copyright Issues. It is particulary the anti-circumvention provisions that are of concern.
Apart from that Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights grants the right to use any medium, and that the proposed law makes it possible for publishers to take away that right, it has also great implications for your computer industry:
In Europe, the U.S. DMCA has become known as the "Snake Oil Protection Act," for just the reasons you are trying to make law: It effectively prohibits exposure of flawed security mechanisms. Because the implementation of security mechanisms can be kept secret, and circumventing them is illegal, effective peer-review has also become illegal. In the U.S., the computer industry has been very fast in abusing this, creating systems that are so weak, they are laughable. However, it is hardly laughable for the man who has been arrested for no other crime than saying it is laughable. He is guilty of no other crime than whistle-blowing. And indeed, whistle-blowing should be every man's right.
To security experts, many similar cases has shown that the anti-circumvention provisions serves no other purpose than to legitimize poor security systems. Thus, in Europe, no computer professional with an interest in security (whom there are too few of) would trust a closed-source system developed in the U.S. Thus the name "Snake Oil Protection Act". Recently, the European Parliament has issued a statement saying such software should be labeled highly unreliable.
Do not make the same mistake!
Yours Sincerely,
Kjetil Kjernsmo
(address removed)
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