Google has moved swiftly to deny comments by its executive chairman (see below) were not a signal it is ready to violate content protection laws it does not agree with. Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt said in London “if there is a law that requires DNS, to do X and it’s passed by both houses of […]
Eric Schmidt, Google’s executive chairman, has said that proposals from the US and British governments to block Internet access to file-sharing websites would endanger freedom of speech and push both countries toward being more like China. “I would be very, very careful if I were a government about arbitrarily [implementing] simple solutions to complex problems,” […]
Sony is struggling to move beyond a high-profile and costly attack on its PlayStation Network that put at risk the personal details of more than 100 million customers. Now the company has faced new security and has taken down a website that allowed users of PlayStation Network and Qriocity, an online entertainment service, to reset […]
Changes to Intellectual Property systems could add up to £7.9 billion to the UK’s economy, the first report looking at how it can drive growth has suggested. The publication of Digital Opportunity follows a six-month independent review of IP and Growth, led by Professor Ian Hargreaves. He was asked to consider how the national and […]
One of the companies used by the French government to track pirates has been hacked. Trident Media Guard monitors P2P networks as part of France’s ‘HADOPI’ anti-piracy measures. Suspected illegal file-sharers are sent three official warnings when identified by firms like TMG, after which they are reported to a judge who can hand out a […]
US senators have re-introduced a bill aimed at giving US authorities more tools to crack down on websites selling pirated movies, television shows and music and counterfeit goods. Senator Patrick Leahy, a Democrat from Vermont, said the legislation would protect the investment American companies make in developing brands and creating content and protect the jobs […]
Sony is planning to restore its online PlayStation Network (PSN) in full by the end of May. It admitted the company had missed a self-imposed deadline of restarting a partial service by the weekend. Sony said it continues to investigate the case, after personal details from 100 million accounts were compromised. The company had originally […]
Sony Chief Executive Officer Howard Stringer has apologised to users of the PlayStation Network and other online services. “As a company we – and I – apologise for the inconvenience and concern caused by this attack,” Stringer said on Sony’s US PlayStation blog. Sony issued its first warning on the break-in a week after it […]
A coalition of artists in music and film has sued CBS Interactive Inc. and CNET Networks, Inc. for mass-scale copyright infringement in Los Angeles federal court. This lawsuit is based on the defendants’ direct participation in massive copyright infringement on peer-to-peer (‘P2P’) systems, such as LimeWire, that are used to copy and distribute songs, films […]
In his first Washington address since becoming Chairman/CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), Senator Chris Dodd has described illegally acquiring movie content as “looting”. In an address to the Media Institute, Dodd said that in the seven weeks since he joined the MPAA, he had learned a great deal about the American […]