European Digital Rights was founded in June 2002. Currently 35 privacy and civil rights organisations have EDRi membership. They are based or have offices in 21 different countries in Europe.
Members of European Digital Rights have joined forces to defend civil rights in the information society. The need for cooperation among organisations active in Europe is increasing as more regulation regarding the internet, copyright and privacy is originating from European institutions, or from international institutions with strong impact in Europe.
News & announcements
The plans to bring ACTA back to life
5 March, 2012
» EU Copyright directive | Internet Blocking | Notice & take-down | Privacy | Copyright | Intellectual Property Enforcement
Introduction
Following the initial discussions in the European Parliament and the overwhelmingly negative workshop that was held on 1 March, ACTA is close to dead in Europe. What are the strategies for bringing it back to life and how will this impact on other similar initiatives? How can activists ensure that our great success so far can be maintained?
FAQ on referral of ACTA to European Court of Justice
23 February, 2012
» Net Neutrality | Internet Blocking | Notice & take-down | Privacy | Copyright | Freedom of speech | Intellectual Property Enforcement
This article is also available in:
Deutsch: Häufig gestellte Fragen zur Vorlage des ACTA-Abkommens beim Europäis...
Following the recent decision of the European Commission to refer the draft Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) to the European Court of Justice, Access and EDRi have prepared this short FAQ to explain this process.
SABAM vs Netlog - another important ruling for fundamental rights
16 February, 2012
» Notice & take-down | Privacy | Copyright | Freedom of speech | Intellectual Property Enforcement | Collecting societies
SABAM (Société Belge des Auteurs, Compositeurs et Editeurs), the Belgian collecting society for music royalties, is in the spotlight again. A few months after the Scarlet/SABAM case, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has released a new decision on the legality of filtering systems on the Internet, this time with regard to filtering of content stored on web services.
Today, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ruled that a social network “cannot be obliged to install a general filtering system, covering all its users, in order to prevent the unlawful use of musical and audio-visual work”.
10 European Commission myths about ACTA
8 February, 2012
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1. This is only about large-scale infringements
a. Criminal sanctions
There is no minimum-level of infringement that could be criminalised by ACTA. It requires parties to, at least, criminalise infringements which are for direct economic advantage, direct commercial advantage, indirect economic advantage, indirect commercial advantage or “aiding and abetting” such an offence.
In the absence of a definition of any these five activities, the European Commission has no way of knowing whether only large-scale infringements will be covered.
ACTA Survival Guide for Website Owners
7 February, 2012
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In order to counter the spreading misinformation, we are providing a how-to with short explanations regarding different practical problems related to ACTA. This guide looks at the risks that ACTA creates for websites, particularly e-commerce sites.
To stay online, a website owner just needs to make sure that their site contains nothing which might cause any of the site's service providers to fear that it contains an (intentional or unintentional) infringement of intellectual property rights. This could include information posted by third parties, such as user-generated content.
ACTA fact sheet
2 February, 2012
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Recently, we have seen many rumours and half-truths about ACTA being circulated by campaigners on all sides. And, as the European Commission's "fact sheet" 10 Myths about ACTA
shows, there are also still a lot of misunderstandings. Many decision makers and citizens seem not yet to be aware of ACTA's serious implications.
In the following, we are focusing on the real problems and most important issues in ACTA:
