SSSCA Is "Dead on Arrival"
Tue, 01/08/2002 - 03:00 — Don Marti
Rep. Darrell Issa, a member of the US House of Representatives' Judiciary Committee, said that Sen. Fritz Hollings' controversial Security Systems Standards and Certification Act (SSSCA) is "dead on arrival in Judiciary".
Speaking to Embedded Linux Journal at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas today, the California Republican said he is opposed to the bill, which would establish a government-mandated copy restriction system for all digital devices. Any House version of the SSSCA would have to go through the Judiciary Committee, with another committee possibly holding hearings as well, he said.
"Can the private sector deliver encryption? Of course they can. It's a choice that people make", Rep. Issa said. He called SSSCA "a bite at the apple that we've already consumed". The 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) explicitly did not require devices to honor copy restriction systems.
"Nothing in this section shall require that the design of, or design and selection of parts and components for, a consumer electronics, telecommunications, or computing product provide for a response to any particular technological measure", the DMCA states.
"I want to have competition between great minds coming up with copyright schemes," Rep. Issa said. Besides thorough opposition for the SSSCA, he showed both knowledge of the DMCA and skepticism about some of its less rational provisions. For example, he brought up the problem that it can often be legal to make a personal copy of a work but illegal to circumvent the copy-restriction technology on it.
And he said that in the case of making it possible for blind people to read e-books, "Fair use, including compliance with ADA, should have equal balance with the DMCA."
Don Marti is Technical Editor of Linux Journal.
Comments
Problems in US?
Let's do business anyplace but america.
Good luck! The places you would actually want to live have many more restrictions than the US does and much higher taxes. The ones with fewer restrictions and lower taxes are...well, go to one of the nicer ones like Sealand for a month or two and you'll see. I don't expect you to believe me without some concrete experience.
Its the same old US mind set again :-). Seriously though, being over in Europe (and I have worked in the states alot BTW), I am stunned at all the the moves going on in the States re SSSCA, DMCA etc etc and yet every American seems to think they are free. Its a good joke but I've heard too much and its becoming boring. Of course there are great things about the US, but there are alot of bad things and you are not as free as you seem to think. Using the words of Rage Against the Machine, Wake Up!
The US is not so much free, as cheap. The main thing which bugs me about this sort of thing is that since America is such a huge market, every device (from a major manufacturer) ends up complying with US regulations. The US legislature is essentially regulating for the world here, even if the manufacturers are based in Asia or elsewhere.
By the way, where the hell is Sealand?
as I recall it's off the coast of Britain...
sealandgov.com and havenco.com
We in the USA should roll down Old Glory and put up Jolly Roger. Americans just need to grow up and have the courage to admit what we are.
Watch out for the sinister second bill, SSSCA renamed.
proclus
what's it called? Link? The SSSCA simply sucked. It doesn't surprise me that some brain dead organization would propose a second revision, but unless others know about it, we can't actively oppose it.