The Obama administration's aggressive approach to online intellectual property enforcement may please Hollywood, but it has also strained the love affair between the president and the tech community. Tuesday's Federal Register included a notice from the administration seeking input for its strategic plan for intellectual property enforcement, which it is required to publish every three years under a 2008 law (PL 110-403). The notice promised even stricter efforts to combat violations, drawing further frustration from tech stakeholders.
No tech policy issue has proven more divisive than intellectual property enforcement, which has turned into an Achilles' heel for the Democrats due to their longstanding ties to Hollywood. The content providers, which include the film and record industries, say rampant online piracy has sapped their bottom lines and destroyed jobs in their sectors. In response, they have urged the government in recent years to aggressively prosecute websites that provide pirated goods, music, and movies. No administration has taken that message to heart more than the current one, under which both the Department of Justice and Immigrations and Customs Enforcement have seen their online piracy enforcement ramp up significantly. Some argue websites' rights have been lost in the shuffle.
Of course, the breaking point for online activists was an attempt to ram through a pair of controversial online piracy bills (S 968, HR 3261), which prompted widespread protests online earlier this year. The legislation, known as SOPA and PIPA, would have allowed copyright holders to obtain court orders forcing sites like Google to delete links to foreign sites with infringing content. Tech activists and groups from across the political spectrum argued the bill went too far and could amount to censorship. Even observers without a stake in the battle were surprised at how far the bill went to accommodate the entertainment industry, at the expense of Silicon Valley. Grass-roots opposition, combined with a day of protests from some of the largest websites, eventually forced both the White House and House Republicans to back off the bill. But Democrats, along with Republican House Judiciary Chairman Lamar Smith of Texas, were noticeably slower to jump ship.
The loss was a major blow to the content industries, which saw their main policy priority crumble in the face of concerted online opposition. So it's not surprising that the Obama administration would attempt to mollify them by stepping up its intellectual property enforcement efforts. But the issue has become a hot button for tech companies, which began shifting some of their support to Republicans even before the SOPA/PIPA battle. As long as the Obama administration and Democrats continue to court the support of the entertainment industry on the issue, they risk alienating some of the largest players in tech policy. IP enforcement has become a proxy for how much the administration is willing to interfere with the Internet in order to appease the interests of old media. As far as Silicon Valley is concerned, Hollywood is just another industry, like the post office and newspapers, unable to cope with the digital disruption of its business model.
IP Enforcement Hearing: The House Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Intellectual Property has a hearing scheduled this morning on international IP enforcement. Teresa Stanek Rea, Deputy Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and White House Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator Victoria Espinel are scheduled to testify. FTC Files Suit Against Hotel Chain Over Data Breaches: The Federal Trade Commission filed suit on Tuesday against the Wyndham hospitality company for data security failures that resulted in three data breaches at the companies' hotels in less than two years. The FTC alleges that Wyndham misrepresented its security measures and failed to take adequate steps to protect consumers' personal information, resulting in fraudulent charges and identity theft. Even after the first breach, the FTC alleges Wyndham failed to take steps to prevent two subsequent breaches in 2009. The case is just the latest instance of the government seeking accountability over a high-profile data breach. There is currently no national law to govern how companies treat consumer information, but a number of varying state laws address the issue. Members of Congress agree on the need for a national data breach standard and have been debating various proposals. Official Hopes Leaks Don't Hamper Information Sharing: With legislation pending that is expected to address the recent rash of national security leaks, the director fo the National Counterterrorism Center said he hopes the leaks won't reverse the progress on information sharing within the intelligence community. The stovepiped nature of intelligence agencies was highlighted after the 9/11 attacks; since then the intelligence community has been under pressure to share information, particularly regarding terrorists. The Obama administration has already opened up a probe into recent disclosures of classified weapons programs. Meanwhile, lawmakers are proposing changes to prevent future leaks, such as expanding the power of inspectors general to investigate.