US six warnings, NZ three for copyright infringing

United States music, movie, television and broadband companies have formed an agreement on best practices for copyright infringement which gives offenders six warnings, compared with New Zealand's Copyright (Infringing File-Sharing) Ammendment Act, which only allows three.

The National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA) said in a release that companies including Twentieth Century Fox and Sony Music, and internet service providers including AT&T and Verizon, had collaborated to form the Copyright Alert System.

The system was a common set of best practices for alerting Internet subscribers when copyrighted content had been downloaded on their account.

The system consisted of up to six electronic alerts, informing the subscriber of misuse of the account, and was of an educational nature - something which NCTA executive vice president James Assey said was critical.

"We are confident that, once informed that content theft is taking place on their accounts, the great majority of broadband subscribers will take steps to stop it."

The agreement was voluntary, established no new laws or regulations, and surprised commentators for its lenient nature, since entertainment groups were seen as the main advocates for a three warnings system in the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. 

The New Zealand Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Ammendment Act established a system of three warnings as law in April.  Public submissions about the method of calculating the awards for infringement and what information copyright owners must send to ISPs closed in May. 

Today, the fees copy rights holders could be charged by ISPs for processing allegations of infringement were announced.

The New Zealand act is notable for its possible penalty of disconnecting an internet subscriber, should the warnings be ignored.  However this penalty is only possible through an Order In Council, created by a cabinet minister and signed by the Governor General.  The Copyright Tribunal is also able to award up to $15,000.

The US Copyright Alert System focussed upon consumer education, the NCTA release said, but would put in a system of "mitigation measures" to stop online content "theft" (a term many internet users have issue with) on accounts that "persistently fail to respond to repeated Copyright Alerts."  These measures would not include termination of the subscriber's account, and ISPs would not provide subscribers' names to rights' holders.

"The system will also provide subscribers the opportunity for an independent review to determine whether a consumer's online activity in question is lawful or if their account was identified in error."

The agreement also established a Center for Copyright Information to educate consumers and support the system's implementation.

The various companies involved lauded the agreement as sensible, and as an example of the private sector co-operating to solve an economic problem. 

Participating ISPs would start implementing the alert system this and next year, the release said.

"This is a sensible approach to the problem of online-content theft and, importantly, one that respects the privacy and rights of our subscribers," Verizon executive vice president Randal Milch said.  "We hope that effort – designed to notify and educate customers, not to penalize them – will set a reasonable standard for both copyright owners and ISPs to follow, while informing customers about copyright laws and encouraging them to get content from the many legal sources that exist."

Commerce Minister Simon Power could not be reached for comment.

Parties involved in the Copyright Alert System agreement:

• MPAA and MPAA members: Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures; Paramount Pictures Corporation; Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc.; Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation; Universal City Studios LLC; and Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.
• RIAA and RIAA members: Universal Music Group Recordings, Warner Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, and EMI Music North America.
• ISPs: AT&T, Cablevision Systems Corp., Comcast Corp., Time Warner Cable, and Verizon.
• IFTA: representing the Independent Producers & Distributors of Film & Television Programming.
• A2IM: representing their 283 music label members, small and medium sized businesses located across the United States representing many different musical genres reflective of the cultural diversity of our country.