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ElcomSoft Lawyer Says Internet Outside U.S. Law
NetRanger writes: "ElcomSoft, the company that employed Dmitry Sklyarov, has fired its opening shot, asking the court to dismiss the charges. Their argument: since the Russian company is based on the Internet, it is outside the jurisdiction of the DMCA. This is rather interesting if it holds up, because it would set a precedent which would allow other countries to tell the DMCA to just go away. If not, ElcomSoft could be out $2.25 million dollars, and the USA could find itself cold-shouldered by a lot of countries with less draconian copyright laws." Wired has another story.
> I wonder if U.S. businesses would enjoy being
:-((
> constrained to French, Chinese or Uzbekistani
> commercial law if a resident there buys their
> product
See This page which explains the negotiation of the Hague convention on jurisdiction and foreign judgments in civil and commercial matters.
I wonder if U.S. citizens would enjoy being constrained to French, Chinese or Uzbekistani civil law if a U.S. business takes a dislike to them.
Now start writing to politicians.
These sigs are more interesting tha
The US cannot continue to try and impose its laws on the rest of the world. The De Beers example is a case in point.
For years the directors of DeBeers have been unable to travel to the US due to outstanding anti-trust caes's against them.
Still they continue to trade, and travel the rest of the world. This article tells how previous cases against the company have failed. Now, having realised how futile their attempts are, they are trying to play nice with the company.
The US can declare jurisdiction over the entire internet, but unless they do a Noriega, and go in and kidnap a few people, the laws will not mean much unless people visit the US.
Live today. Tomorrow will cost a lot more!
Actually, in that case they were calling into question the logic behind certain zoning restrictions. Many municipalities have placed zoning restrictions over certain types of businesses based on the concept of "network effects". This was aimed at bars and strip clubs by saying that these businesses would attract unwelcome people into the neighborhood. These people would, of course, have the effect of depressing property values.
In the case of VoyeurDorm the argument was made that since the company "operated" on the Internet, the normal objection to these "network effects" was moot. No clientele were actually driving to the site to view this, in fact, they were sitting in the privacy of their own home watching via their computer.
So, this case wasn't about the law/lawlessness of the Internet, just that since the actual "business" didn't occur in the physical location in question, then restrictions based on physical location were moot.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Their website lists a 509 area code (Washington). Apparently their servers were also physically located in the US
Here is a link to a (very) summerized verion of the DMCA. This shows how the Senator is making no mention of the SSSCA on his own web site where he proudly lists the issues he has worked on. Lots of other gigantic conflicts of interest can be found here as well. I'd list more, but I have to go to work so I can make money to buy things that violate the DMCA..
American civil procedure provides for jurisdiction over foreign companies that do business in America. The theory is that if you come to America and avail yourself of our markets, resources, society, labor, and laws, you are bound to obey our laws. This does not mean that you can be sued in New York if you offer goods for sale in China and some American happens to buy them while on vacation in Beijing. It does mean, though, that if you knowingly advertise in America, ship goods to America, or provide services to American clients, you can be sued in America for violating American law.
On the Internet, this analysis is a little complicated because websites are accessed internationally, and it is difficult to detect what country people are really browsing from. Still, efforts can be made to exclude certain jurisdictions. For example, Lindows.com used to have a message on their website that refusing to do business in Washington state. This is because they were trying to avoid being dragged into court by MSFT in Washington state.
There is plenty of caselaw on this emerging area of law:
As the cases make clear, there is a sliding scale that stretches from (1) passive website relating to local activities to (2) interactive website offering services to anybody across the land. Elcomsoft sounds a lot more like Zippo than it does the Blue Note jazz club in Missouri. If they are offering their services to Americans and offering downloads to Americans, they have to expect that they might be sued by Americans in America.
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. This is based on my interpretation of Finnish law, based on published cases and sites like this.
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Finnish copyright law is kind of nice; it has lots of free use provisions (e.g. the right to copy and convert copyrighted material that you have bought the right to use as necessary to use it (irrespective of license agreements)).
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The EU in general seems not to recognise software patents, AFAIK.
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Strong crypto is completely legal in Finland; I regularly use military-grade PGP at school to send in assignments.
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Censorship in Finland is mostly limited to broadcast media (e.g. TV).
The rest of your points I'm not too sure about, but I have not heard of any nasty cases regarding them.Finland is quite nicely connected, especially in urban areas (and university campuses). Consumer broadband is a bit on the expensive site but becoming widely available.