According to “Digital copyright: it’s all wrong” a report in Fairfax newspapers from Graeme Philipson, the US has “circulated a draft Discussion Paper on a possible anti-counterfeiting trade agreement (ACTA) for the next G8 meeting in Tokyo in July.” This document is concerning those who have read it, as it “would enable any border guard, in any treaty country, to check any electronic device for any content that they suspect infringes copyright laws”. Only suspicion is required to be able to legally enable this to happen.”

In Australia, they would almost have to pull up everyone carrying a phone, a laptop or other mobile device on suspicion of having something illegal contained therein. Then there is the time it would take to check such devices to find any infringing content. We already have long lead times at our ports of departure, this would only make it so much longer again. However, that doesn’t put it out of the realm of possibility.

The agreement also proposes an international copyright governing organisation, separate to the World Trade Organisation and the United Nations, ” a global police force, answerable to no-one, with intrusive powers that vastly exceed those currently available to adherents of the concepts of intellectual property.”

What happens with mashups then too, where content has been remixed. Will this governing organisation be manning all partner country ports to do the examining and assessing of the legality of a device’s content?

There is a big can of worms in this discussion paper and I have only touched on a few of them. What other issues can you see being raised by this and do you think it will ever make it into law?