Free Republic

It is no secret that the MPAA and other pro-copyright groups lobby politicians and law enforcers, but when a column by a prominent Attorney General appears to be written directly by the entertainment industries something is horribly wrong. A few days ago Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff wrote an article in the Salt Lake City Tribune. In the column the Attorney General stresses how important it is for Congress to pass the SOPA and PIPA bills. The MPAA is delighted with the support and praised it in a blog post yesterday. “Shurtleff effectively hammers the point that Google, Yahoo and...

Breaking News: Feds Falsely Censor Popular Blog For Over A Year, Deny All Due Process, Hide All Details... from the copyright-as-censorship dept Imagine if the US government, with no notice or warning, raided a small but popular magazine's offices over a Thanksgiving weekend, seized the company's printing presses, and told the world that the magazine was a criminal enterprise with a giant banner on their building. Then imagine that it never arrested anyone, never let a trial happen, and filed everything about the case under seal, not even letting the magazine's lawyers talk to the judge presiding over the case....

The U.S. Government is determined to put an end to online piracy. In an attempt to give copyright holders and the authorities all the tools required to disable access to so-called rogue sites, lawmakers will soon introduce the PROTECT IP Act. Through domain seizures, ISP blockades, search engine censorship, and cutting funding of allegedly copyright infringing websites, the bill takes Internet censorship to the next level. Internet censorship is a hot topic this year. During the past 12 months the U.S. Government seized more than 100 domain names it claimed were promoting copyright infringement. But this was just the beginning....

Breaking: Newly Obtained Homeland Security Documents Reveal Radical Shift In Internet Policy FIGHT BACK: Internet user arrested for linking to other websites. UPDATE:  Lots of coverage of our efforts this week. THE HILL: Groups slam online piracy efforts; TECHDIRT: People Across Political Spectrum Come Out Against COICA Censorship Bill; CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY: Online piracy bipartisan domain; POLITICO: Groups blast Leahy piracy bill. ORIGINAL: Brian McCarthy ran a website, channelsurfing.net, that linked to various sites where you could watch online streams of TV shows and sports networks. A couple months ago, the government seized his domain name and on Friday they arrested...

Following on from news of the third phase of ‘piracy’ and counterfeit related domain seizures in 7 months, US Senator Ron Wyden has asked the director of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to clarify some of the most pressing questions. If the domain seizures are to continue, the Obama administration has to be more open about the need for them and the process involved, he argues. Earlier this week we broke the news that US authorities had started a third round of domain seizures. This time, it turned out that the actions were aimed at sports streaming sites....

Censorship and suppression live on at DHS and ICE. Remember, First They Came for the Bloggers… The copyright infringement travesty just goes on and on. Another holiday and another crackdown on America. From the TSA violating your Fourth Amendment rights, to the jackbooted thugs raiding farms, to the FCC clamping down on conservative free speech, to the silencing of voices on the web – I think you know where this leads and Americans better find their voices and stop this before somebody gets cranky… The U.S. government under the guise of DHS and ICE have just seized the BitTorrent search...

The Senators who had the unmitigated gall to vote for the COICA bill (Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act) violate our basic fundamental right to free speech. The net is the final frontier for truth and free speech. The cost is great: lots of lies and liars and Soros-funded propagandists -- but so what? Techdirt explains: (hat tip Katherine) First off, the bill would allow the Justice Department to take down an entire website, effectively creating a blacklist, akin to just about every internet censoring regime out there. Now, it is true that there is a judicial process involved. The...

The U.S. government is shutting down websites suspected of copyright infringement or selling counterfeit goods as Congress debates a bill that would give feds more authority to do so. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), an agency within the Homeland Security Department, has seized more than 70 websites in recent days, according to the Wall Street Journal, and posted a notice saying that the domain name has been seized by ICE through court-ordered warrants. The notice also states penalties for willful copyright infringement and trafficking in counterfeit goods. Neither ICE nor Homeland Security responded to messages seeking comment. An ICE spokeswoman...

When Senators give speeches, they will say that you can’t put a price on freedom. But as it turns out you can. You can actually put an exact dollar amount on the Constitution. And that amount is $335,906. That’s the amount that Hollywood gave Senator Patrick Leahy. And in return, Leahy gave them COICA. That’s not the same of some new disease, it’s the abbreviation for Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act, the biggest and more comprehensive internet censorship proposal in the history of this country. It would give Attorney General Eric Holder the power to create a blacklist of...

<p>We conservatives agree that the federal government should be smaller, less costly and less intrusive. We also believe in the rule of law, the enforcement of our law, and the Constitution as written. In other words, true conservatives understand that there are some functions of government that serve a necessary purpose and that are required by the Constitution. In that vein, laws giving the federal government the authority....</p>

On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously approved a bill that would give the Attorney General the right to shut down websites with a court order if copyright infringement is deemed “central to the activity” of the site — regardless if the website has actually committed a crime. The Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA) is among the most draconian laws ever considered to combat digital piracy, and contains what some have called the “nuclear option,” which would essentially allow the Attorney General to turn suspected websites “off.” COICA is the latest effort by Hollywood, the recording industry and...

The politicians are at it again. They never cease to amaze for their constantly revolving attempts to take over complete control of the Internet and everything connected to it. This time, in the guise of safeguarding copyrighted material, Congressional Democrats intend to introduce into this zombie session of congress the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA). COICA would give the Attorney General the power to shut down websites accused of illegally distributing copyrighted material by requiring Internet Service Providers to block such sites from its customers. Certainly, as a capitalist, I am solidly for protections against copyright infringement, but,...

Senate sponsors have eased off a bill aimed at cracking down on online piracy after an outcry from Internet engineers who say the proposal would effectively censor the Web. The Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act still would contain some highly controversial provisions, but senators proposed an amendment Wednesday to strip from the bill language that allowed the Justice Department to publish a blacklist of websites "dedicated to infringing activities." Under the original bill, the Justice Department would be able to green light Internet service providers to go after those sites by providing them legal immunity. The amendment also would...