Norwegian Teen Becomes Industry's Latest Test Case

The home of a Norwegian teenager was raided by the police today [Wednesday, January 25, 2000] acting at the behest of the motion picture industry intent on suppressing discussion and distribution of DVD-viewing software developed outside of industry's monopoly on such software. This action follows closely three lawsuits filed by the industry in California, New York, and Connecticut against numerous individuals and organizations including coders, journalists, an ISP, and numerous Netizens. ""The motion picture industry is using its substantial resources to intimidate the technical community into surrendering rights of free expression and fair use of information,"" said Tara Lemmey, Executive Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. ""These actions are a wake-up call for the technical community. The process of reverse-engineering and public posting and commenting of code that the MPAA is attempting to suppress is fundamental to the development of commercial and open source software."" Sixteen-year-old Jon Johansen, who was among the first to post the DeCSS program that allows users to view DVDs on computers not using Windows or Macintosh operating systems, had his computer and cellular telephone seized by police. Both he and his father were questioned at length by the police and have been threatened with indictment for posting the code, which the motion picture industry claims was illegally created. According to several international legal experts contacted by EFF, the industry is relying on untested legal theory in its case against Johansen. With regard to the industry's use of Norwegian Criminal Code sect 145(2), a provision making it illegal to ""break a security arrangement"" to access data, experts agree that it is not clear whether it can apply to a situation where someone breaks a security system to access material on a device of which that person is the owner. The second charge of contributory copyright infringement, as likely to be argued in this case, has also not been before the Norwegian courts. The actions being brought by the motion picture industry have attracted the attention of the Global Internet Liberty Campaign (GILC), a coalition of over 50 international civil liberties and human rights groups. ""We believe that intellectual property owners should not be allowed to expand their property rights at the expense of free speech, legal reverse-engineering of software programs for interoperability reasons, and discussions of technical and scientific issues on the Internet,"" wrote GILC members in a statement released last week. ""DVD-CCA's lawsuit is in direct conflict with United Nations human rights accords and the First Amendment of the United States Constitution."" (EFF is a GILC member.) EFF will continue fighting the industry's attempts to censor Web sites discussing DVD technology, including assisting Johansen and his family in finding legal representation in Norway. All of these steps are part of EFF's Campaign for Audiovisual Free Expression (CAFE), which it launched last summer to address complex societal and legal issues raised by new technological measures for protecting intellectual property rights. About The Electronic Frontier FoundationThe Electronic Frontier Foundation ( http://www.eff.org ) is a leading global nonprofit organization linking technical architectures with legal frameworks to support the rights of individuals in an open society. Founded in 1990, EFF actively encourages and challenges industry and government to support free expression, privacy, and openness in the information society. EFF is a member-supported organization and maintains one of the most-linked-to Web sites in the world.

For complete information on the MPAA and DVD-CCA cases, see:http://www.eff.org/IP/Video. To learn more about EFF's Campaign for Audiovisual Free Expression, see: http://www.eff.org/cafe. For information on the Global Internet Liberty Campaign, s