Fallen Angel
05-01-2009, 01:10 PM
Canada a Global Haven for Digital Pirates: U.S.
Our true north may be strong and free, but the Canadian digital environment is weak, insecure and unprotected.
The situation is said to be so bad that Canada has been elevated to an international anti-piracy Watch List.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) released its annual “Special 301” Report on the adequacy and effectiveness of intellectual property rights (IPR) protection by U.S. trading partners, and it places Canada on the Priority Watch List for the first time ever.
Canada joins 11 other countries on the Watch List: China, Russia, Algeria, Argentina, Chile, India, Indonesia, Israel, Pakistan, Thailand, and Venezuela – all of which will be the target of particularly intense engagement through bilateral discussion during the coming year.
"The United States continues to have serious concerns with Canada's failure to accede to and implement the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) Internet treaties which Canada signed in 1997," the report said.
The action follows a recommendation by the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA) that Canada be elevated to the List in 2009.
The International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA) is a private sector coalition formed in 1984 to represent the U.S. copyright-based industries in bilateral and multilateral efforts to improve international protection of copyrighted materials. IIPA is comprised of seven trade associations, each representing a significant segment of the U.S. copyright community.
Its member associations represent 1,900 U.S. companies producing and distributing materials protected by copyright laws throughout the world – including some of the biggest names in information and communications technology.
Represented are consumer and business products and applications including software and entertainment software (such as videogame CDs and cartridges, personal computer CD-ROMs and multimedia products); theatrical films, television programs, home videos and digital representations of audiovisual works; music, records, CDs, and audiocassettes; and textbooks, tradebooks, reference and professional publications and journals (in both electronic and print media).
“T[he] Special 301 Report guides our efforts to protect American innovation and creativity around the world,” announced U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk. “Our creative and innovative products can hit the global marketplace sometimes with just a keystroke. If we and our trading partners are not vigilant in protecting and enforcing intellectual property rights, they can vanish just as quickly.”
Canada is woefully behind the rest of the developed world (and many countries in the developing world as well) in implementing legislation in support of a healthy online environment that protects copyright and intellectual property in the digital age, the report posits.
Legislatively, the country has long-standing deficiencies in its system for legal enforcement of intellectual property rights. Practically, it has yet to formally regulate the role of Internet Service Providers, for example, in combating online piracy – or for protecting personal privacy, for that matter.
Some excerpts from the IIPA’s Executive Summary shows the degree of frustration and concern expressed:
“Canada, virtually alone among developed economies in the OECD, remains almost entirely out of compliance with the global minimum world standards.....Canada’s enforcement record also falls far short of what should be expected of our neighbor and largest trading partner, with ineffective border controls, insufficient enforcement resources, inadequate enforcement policies, and a seeming unwillingness to impose deterrent penalties on pirates…
... the piracy picture in Canada is at least as bleak as it was a year ago.
To underscore U.S. insistence that Canada finally take action to address the serious piracy problem it has allowed to develop just across our border, and that it bring its outmoded laws up to contemporary international standards, IIPA recommended that Canada be elevated to the Priority Watch List earlier this year.”
“As U.S. right holders, businesses, and workers suffer losses from international piracy, counterfeiting, and other forms of IPR theft, the Special 301 Report provides a critical policy tool for focusing on urgent problems that undermine one of America’s great strengths in the global economy – our innovation and creativity,” Kirk continued. “In this time of economic uncertainty, we need to redouble our efforts to work with all of our trading partners – even our closest allies and neighbors such as Canada – to enhance protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights in the context of a rules-based trading system.”
This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Special 301 Report, first issued in 1989 in accordance with the provisions of the U.S. Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988.
Our true north may be strong and free, but the Canadian digital environment is weak, insecure and unprotected.
The situation is said to be so bad that Canada has been elevated to an international anti-piracy Watch List.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) released its annual “Special 301” Report on the adequacy and effectiveness of intellectual property rights (IPR) protection by U.S. trading partners, and it places Canada on the Priority Watch List for the first time ever.
Canada joins 11 other countries on the Watch List: China, Russia, Algeria, Argentina, Chile, India, Indonesia, Israel, Pakistan, Thailand, and Venezuela – all of which will be the target of particularly intense engagement through bilateral discussion during the coming year.
"The United States continues to have serious concerns with Canada's failure to accede to and implement the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) Internet treaties which Canada signed in 1997," the report said.
The action follows a recommendation by the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA) that Canada be elevated to the List in 2009.
The International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA) is a private sector coalition formed in 1984 to represent the U.S. copyright-based industries in bilateral and multilateral efforts to improve international protection of copyrighted materials. IIPA is comprised of seven trade associations, each representing a significant segment of the U.S. copyright community.
Its member associations represent 1,900 U.S. companies producing and distributing materials protected by copyright laws throughout the world – including some of the biggest names in information and communications technology.
Represented are consumer and business products and applications including software and entertainment software (such as videogame CDs and cartridges, personal computer CD-ROMs and multimedia products); theatrical films, television programs, home videos and digital representations of audiovisual works; music, records, CDs, and audiocassettes; and textbooks, tradebooks, reference and professional publications and journals (in both electronic and print media).
“T[he] Special 301 Report guides our efforts to protect American innovation and creativity around the world,” announced U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk. “Our creative and innovative products can hit the global marketplace sometimes with just a keystroke. If we and our trading partners are not vigilant in protecting and enforcing intellectual property rights, they can vanish just as quickly.”
Canada is woefully behind the rest of the developed world (and many countries in the developing world as well) in implementing legislation in support of a healthy online environment that protects copyright and intellectual property in the digital age, the report posits.
Legislatively, the country has long-standing deficiencies in its system for legal enforcement of intellectual property rights. Practically, it has yet to formally regulate the role of Internet Service Providers, for example, in combating online piracy – or for protecting personal privacy, for that matter.
Some excerpts from the IIPA’s Executive Summary shows the degree of frustration and concern expressed:
“Canada, virtually alone among developed economies in the OECD, remains almost entirely out of compliance with the global minimum world standards.....Canada’s enforcement record also falls far short of what should be expected of our neighbor and largest trading partner, with ineffective border controls, insufficient enforcement resources, inadequate enforcement policies, and a seeming unwillingness to impose deterrent penalties on pirates…
... the piracy picture in Canada is at least as bleak as it was a year ago.
To underscore U.S. insistence that Canada finally take action to address the serious piracy problem it has allowed to develop just across our border, and that it bring its outmoded laws up to contemporary international standards, IIPA recommended that Canada be elevated to the Priority Watch List earlier this year.”
“As U.S. right holders, businesses, and workers suffer losses from international piracy, counterfeiting, and other forms of IPR theft, the Special 301 Report provides a critical policy tool for focusing on urgent problems that undermine one of America’s great strengths in the global economy – our innovation and creativity,” Kirk continued. “In this time of economic uncertainty, we need to redouble our efforts to work with all of our trading partners – even our closest allies and neighbors such as Canada – to enhance protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights in the context of a rules-based trading system.”
This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Special 301 Report, first issued in 1989 in accordance with the provisions of the U.S. Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988.