Assaulting Your Digital Rights
Here's an update on some truly lousy legislation making its way through the Tennessee legislature. The legislation - which I wrote about here and here in the last month - would create a state version of the controversial federal Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Unfortunately, this bad legislation is moving rapidly through the legislature without press scrutiny or the public outcry it deserves. The Tennessean finally covered the legislation today, in a story that seems to favor the legislation and accept the Tennessee Cable Television Association's view favoring the legislation. But at least the paper acknowledged the other side of the story - that the law will "jeopardize the privacy and civil liberties of those who use the devices" encompassed by the legislation:

The proposal originally made it a crime to knowingly use an "'unlawful communication device'" to receive "any communication service without the express consent" of the company providing the service, which could be an Internet service provider, cable company or telephone company. That would have let those companies "effectively control what you can connect in your living room," said Fred Von Lohmann, a senior attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco advocacy group that opposes the bill. Opponents, including Von Lohmann's group, say the original bill would outlaw commonly used computer-security software such as firewalls, citing wording that outlaws use of an "unlawful communication device" to conceal the origin or destination of a communication.

But beyond that The Tennessean's story fails to explore the much-broader ramifications of the bill beyond the cable TV industry. Memo to The Tennessean: this legislation is about much, much more than cable TV. It is about Hollywood asserting control over all digital technology. Some sections of the draft legislation even banned research and writing about technologies such as computer security, filtering and other important Internet topics that might lead to infringing copyrights.

The legislation is backed by the powerful Motion Picture Association of America, which is, no doubt, greasing the campaign warchests of legislators who sponsor and support it. The legislation calls for criminal charges against individuals who provide or employ devices "with the intent to defraud a communication service provider." But opponents say the law's too-broad definitions could outlaw useful devices merely on the basis that they might be used for illicit purposes. The baby DMCA laws have already passed in Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, Michigan, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Wyoming, and are working their way through legislatures in Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Massachusetts, Oregon, and Texas as well as in Tennessee, where the judiciary committee of the state Senate has recommended the passage, with amendments, of the proposed legislation. Sen. Curtis Person is pushing the bad legislation in the state Senate. In the state House, the legislation is being pushed by Rep. Rob Briley.

It's lousy law. For a better understanding of why, please read this piece examining the virtually identical legislation under consideration in Florida.

Feel free to email Person and Briley and tell them to stop the mini-DMCA. You should also email your state representatives and state senators to urge them to vote against House Bill 457 and Senate Bill 213 when it comes to their committee or to the floor.

For more, see Copyfight.org and blogger Aaron Schwartz, Princeton professor Edward Felton's blog, this roundup from John Palfrey, executive director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, as well as this Electronic Frontier Foundation round-up of information, and this recent story from the Boston Globe.

And please remind your legislators they work for you, not for the Motion Picture Association of America.