Home
Empowerment through collective innovation

Koumbit 5@7: ACTA - A Secret Treaty to Criminalize Sharing Knowledge and Information

Submitted by sofian on Sat, 19/06/2010 - 22:14

ACTA is a secretly negotiated international trade agreement. Its stated objectives are to enforce copyright and tackle counterfeited goods (hence its acronym: Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement).

For our next 5@7 on Friday, June 25th, we have invited Anthony Hémond of FACIL pour l'appropriation collective de l'informatique libre to discuss ACTA and its potential implications on access to knowledge, privacy, Net Neutrality, and fundamental rights.

Leaked documents indicate that ACTA would:

  • allow Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to monitor the content of their clients Internet usage and cut them off based on an allegation of copyright infringment;
  • authorize border guards to search laptops, electronic devices and seize them if they contain material that appears to infringe on copyright;
  • introduce new criminal sanctions for copyright infringements, including sanctions for certain uses of the Internet that previously were not criminalized;
  • establish “graduated response” measures and Internet Service Provider (ISP) liability, which leads to Internet filtering, as well as limits to the interoperability of legally acquired digital works;
  • affect other important issues, such as access to medication.

The ongoing negotiations include the European Union, the United States, Japan, Canada, South Korea, Australia as well as a few other countries. Many observers have noted the interesting absence of several of the worlds biggest nations from the table.

Koumbit is deeply concerned by this treaty being negotiated behind closed doors. We want you to know what is going on and how it can shape relationships between people on the Internet. To that end, Anthony's presentation will be filmed by the folks at Funambules media for production of an online video.

Details:

Date:
Friday, June 25th, 2010
Time:
17:00 onward
Where:
Our offices are located at 6833 de l'Épée, suite #308, just a short walk from l'Acadie metro station.

Koumbit is a Montreal-based non-profit organisation established in 2004 whose primary activity consists of developing and hosting web sites for other non-profits, as well as helping them appropriate emerging information technology tools. Its founding principles are based on participatory economics, social justice and free/open source software.