Rockbites: RIAA attempts to add invasive text to USA Act

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RIAA attempts to add invasive text to USA Act
17 October 2001

The new US anti-terrorism law, dubbed the USA Act and approved in slightly different versions by the two houses of Congress last week, includes language that expands the range of allowable actions by law enforcement officers when fighting cybercrime. It also broadens the definition of terror-based cybercrime. Specifically, hackers who cause aggregate damage in excess of US$5,000—as opposed to that much damage to one system—would be punishable under the law. In addition, any hacking that interferes with medical treatment, or that endagers people, would become punishable under the law.
    There’s one exclusionary sentence that says if such harm results from “negligent design or manufacture,” those responsible for the bad design would be exempt. (Negligent manufacturers might still be liable under other laws, of course.)
    Over the past few weeks, in an astonishingly brash, insensitive, and stupid move, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)—the legal arm of America’s major record labels—has been attempting to piggy-back additional text onto the USA Act that would permit any copyright holder (such as them) to hack any number of computers for the purpose of stopping copyright infringement, along the way causing any amount of collateral economic damage or public harm or endangerment while remaining immune from the Act’s criminal provisions. Though turned down by both houses of Congress, the RIAA are continuing their lobbying efforts to ammend the USA Act.
    The RIAA’s Legislative Counsel and Senior Vice President of Government Relations, Mitch Glazier, told Wired.com this week that his group believes that under standing US law they are allowed to commit vigilante-style cyber-attacks against computers or networks they consider involved in copyright infringement. He sees their efforts to ammend the USA Act as simply “...a general fix to bring back current law.”
    The RIAA has not released the new text of their USA Act ammendment, which they say differs substantially from the one obtained on Monday by Wired and by Wartimeliberty.com. | Wired story | | US cybercrime law | | USA Act  | | RIAA ammendment | | top of page |

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