TLD Operators Should Not Police Content, Says EFF

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TLD Operators Should Not Police Content, Says EFF

By CircleID Reporter
February 11, 2016, 1:17 am PST Views: 17,548 Comments: 1

Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) released a letter today stating “companies and organizations that run the Internet’s domain name system shouldn’t be in the business of policing the contents of websites, or enforcing laws that can impinge on free speech.” The statement was released in light Donuts, the largest operator of new domain name extensions, and the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) jointly announcing an agreement yesterday to disable or suspend domain names of copyright-infringing websites. More specifically, “[u]nder the terms of the agreement, the MPAA will be treated as a ‘Trusted Notifier’ for the purpose of reporting large-scale pirate websites that are registered in a domain extension operated by Donuts,” says the join announcement.

EFF has expressed concern that “if what’s past is prologue, expect to see MPAA and other groups of powerful media companies touting the Donuts agreement as a new norm, and using it to push ICANN and governments towards making all domain name registries disable access to an entire website on a mere accusation of infringement.”

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The Link Between Piracy and Consumer Safety Tom Galvin – Feb 13, 2016 8:01 PM

The MPAA-Donuts Trusted Notifier program has been designed to only report the worst-of-the-worst sites that illegally host hundreds of full-length movies, all too often with malware that exposes consumers to harm.

Other influencers have weighed in with their support of the MPAA-Donuts agreement:

http://illusionofmore.com/what-exactly-does-the-eff-want/
http://voxindie.org/eff-doesnt-like-donuts-new-voluntary-agreement-with-mpaa/

—Tom Galvin
Digital Citizens Alliance

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