Appeals Court Clears Norwegian of DVD Piracy Charges
- By Grey McKenzie
- Published 02/20/2008
Grey McKenzie
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The court upheld an earlier verdict that Jon Johansen, 20, had not broken the law by creating a system that could get around copy protection on DVDs.
The ruling is a setback to anti-piracy efforts by the Hollywood studios.
The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) said it
was disappointed by the court's decision, saying it encouraged others
to circumvent copyright controls.
Free to copy
The case was seen as a major test of Norway's computer protection laws
Mr Johansen, known as "DVD Jon" by the net community, created his program to watch films on a Linux-based computer.
He then posted the program onto the net in 1999.
His software, called DeCSS, could decrypt disks by stripping the Content Scrambling System from DVDs.
The US movie industry had accused DVD Jon of theft. But an Oslo court said in January 2003 that he was free to do what he wanted with DVDs he bought legally.
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