By a decisive vote, the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday passed a controversial bill strengthening the enforcement of anti-counterfeiting laws with strong backing from the music and movie industries.

The bill, known as Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act of 2008, passed in the Senate on Friday. Now, with the blessing of the House by a vote of 381 to 41, the bill heads to the White House, where it faces an uncertain fate.

Among the key provisions in the bill include increased funding of the divisions of federal and state law enforcement agencies that combat computer crime, and a forfeiture clause that could result in the seizure of property such as computers, servers and storage devices connected to an infringement case.

Supporters of the bill describe it as a vital measure to protect an important segment of the U.S. economy that is under siege from foreign and domestic piracy.

One estimate from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a multinational economic forum, put the annual cost of global intellectual-property infringement at several hundred billion dollars, a net loss which supporters of the bill said correlates to the disappearance of hundreds of thousands of U.S. jobs.

In a statement praising the Senate's passage of the bill, Mitch Bainwol, chairman and CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) said, "This bill truly is music to the ears of all those who care about strengthening American creativity and jobs. At a critical economic juncture, this bipartisan legislation provides enhanced protection for an important asset that helps lead our global competitiveness."

Removed from the final version of the bill was a controversial provision that would have allocated already-strained federal resources within the Justice Department to litigate civil proceedings on behalf of intellectual-property rights holders, a move that critics called an "enormous gift" to the entertainment industry and a waste of taxpayer money.

In a letter (PDF) sent to leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee, administration officials warned that the provision "could result in Department of Justice prosecutors serving as pro bono lawyers for private copyright holders regardless of their resources. In effect, taxpayer-supported department lawyers would pursue lawsuits for copyright holders, with monetary recovery going to industry," wrote Keith Nelson, an assistant attorney with the DoJ, and Lily Fu Claffee, general counsel for the Commerce Department.

LATEST NEWS

UCSD Plans First Flash-Based Supercomputer
Digging Into N.Y.'s Antitrust Suit Against Intel
Analyst: Sony-Ericsson's Android Bid Is Late
Coupon Site Targets Black Friday, Cyber Monday
Microsoft Sites Up Big in Time Spent Online

The Justice Department currently litigates intellectual-property cases in criminal court, but the right-holders are responsible for bringing civil cases to trial.

While the DoJ civil-litigation provision was struck from the final version, the bill still contains another section objectionable to the administration that would create a new position with the title of "intellectual property enforcement representative."

The presidential appointee would be responsible for overseeing an interagency advisory committee charged with pursuing and prosecuting pirates, operating within the Executive Office of the President (EOP). Moving the oversight of intellectual-property and counterfeiting enforcement from the Commerce Department, where it currently resides, to the EOP "constitutes a legislative intrusion into the internal structure and composition of the president's administration," according to the letter penned by Nelson and Claffee.

The officials concluded that that provision in the bill could be a breach of the constitutional protection regarding separation of different branches of power in the U.S. government.

A White House spokesman did not immediately return a call for comment on the administration's position on the bill as passed.

The bill also came under fire from digital advocacy groups such as Public Knowledge and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

"The bill only adds more imbalance to a copyright law that favors large media companies," Gigi Sohn, president and cofounder of Public Knowledge, said in a statement. "At a time when the entire digital world is going to less restrictive distribution models, and when the courts are aghast at the outlandish damages being inflicted on consumers in copyright cases, this bill goes entirely in the wrong direction."

Sohn was referring to some of the more than 30,000 lawsuits that the RIAA has brought against consumers for sharing music on peer-to-peer networks. The highest-profile of these cases involves Jammie Thomas, a Minnesota woman whom a judge last October ordered to pay the RIAA damages in the amount of $222,000 for copying 26 songs from the peer-to-peer site Kazaa. Thomas has countersued, and the case is ongoing.

In addition to the music and movie industries, supporters of the bill included the Software Information Industry Association (SIIA), the trade association representing software industry. The group has been ramping up its own litigation tactics to combat software piracy, suing individual sellers on eBay, and mulling suits against sellers on other auction sites, and possibly against eBay itself.

"During this time of economic uncertainty, the software and digital content industry commends the U.S. Congress for taking concrete steps today to protect our nation's vital intellectual property assets," SIIA President Ken Wasch said in a statement.