Intellectual Property Law

Terrorism by Copyright Infringement?

In testimony before the House Committee on International Relations’ Subcommittee on International Terrorism and Nonproliferation, Frank C. Urbancic, Principal Deputy Coordinator for Counterterrorism U.S. Department of State, declared: “Hizballah supporters and sympathizers are also involved in a number of illegal activities, including smuggling, drug and arms trafficking, money laundering, fraud, intellectual property piracy, and other transnational crime.” (Full testimony of Frank Urbancic here.) That?s right. Terrorism and copyright infringement, together again. It?s not the first time the two appear in the same sentence in the halls of congress. Urbancic was reaching for an angle for showing Hezbollah influence in Latin America, no less, admitting that there was no credible evidence of Hezbollah cells in Latin America, but there was copyright infringement and money laundering and such going on there, and Hezbollah sympathizers making illegal copies and such, and, implicitly, that was good enough.

Come again? There are plenty of GOP supporters and sympathizers engaged in copyright infringement, too. And, yes, Democrats and independents, too, are sometimes caught infringing — or at least their sympathizers are. I?ll bet there are sympathizers of both major U.S. political parties in Latin America, no doubt, and of the Green Party too. I’m sure there must be copyright infringement going on among KKK members or sympathizers, and NAACP members and sympathizers too. And let’s not leave out Baptists or Catholics or any other religious groups ? I?ve personally met Baptists and Catholics in Latin America, and I have direct evidence of a Baptist (who was a Catholic sympathizer) engaged in copyright infringement in Chile, back as early as 1969. Perhaps the State Department should follow up.

Seriously, it cheapens responsible law enforcement efforts to take garden-variety crimes like copyright infringement and make sweeping allegations that because members or sympathizers of an organization are engaged in it, there is evidence of illegal activity of a much more serious nature by that organization or its sympathizers. I’m sure that with the right interrogation techniques, we could find that pedophiles regularly infringe copyrights, plus, they drive over the speed limit. It proves nothing about pedophiles, the organizations they may belong to or sympathize with, or whether children are at risk of being sexually molested by speedsters or copyright infringers.

Copyright infringement is a problem to be dealt with on its own merits. So are driving over the speed limit, money laundering, smuggling, and any other illegal activity you can think of. When policymakers too often try to tie them together, borrowing from the pervasiveness of some offenses (like copyright infringement) to establish guilt of the “members and sympathizers” of an organization (like ?terrorists?), or conversely, by trying to make some offenses (like copyright infringement) sound worse by claiming that a disfavored group (like ?terrorists?) engage in it. Neither tactic serves the interests of law and order.

Sound anti-terrorism policy requires that we examine carefully what it takes to be branded a “terrorist” — whether we include those who carried out the Boston Tea Party, for example, and if not, where we draw the line — and that we examine how best to deal with the identified problem of terrorism. Sound copyright policy requires that we carefully examine what should and should not constitute copyright infringement, and that we find the best solutions to dealing with the problem of copyright infringement, once identified. But to try to tie disparate offenses together by the mere fact that there may be some overlap between terrorists, Hezbollah membership, and copyright infringement is at best foolish.

We would scoff if the State Department were to shout: “The copyright infringers are coming! Terrorists are among their ranks! Run for your lives!” Testimony suggesting that copyright infringers in Latin America include Hezbollah sympathizers who may use money earned from selling bootleg copies of software to finance establishment of a terrorist cell in Latin America is just as far-fetched.

Full post as published by CopyOwner on September 29, 2006 (boomark / email).