Spain are the ACT adhiere

Last night our colleague Geraldine told us a fact that was going to happen today : the European Commission would sign their accession to ACTA , the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or anti-counterfeiting trade agreement, an international voluntary membership an iron gives protection to any type of content subject to copyright which imposes international sanctions and imprisonment. This regulatory framework is quite dark because it does not belong to any official body (EU, UN, WTO, etc.) and the accession negotiations are usually pretty tight and, as expected, today was the turn of the European Union and 22 of its member countries, including Spain, and as expected, have signed their commitment to act in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan.

Specifically, the Member States of the European Union have joined the ACT are in addition to Spain, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Sweden and the United Kingdom, 22 countries that join a dubious "select club" formed by the United States, Australia, Canada, Japan, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore and South Korea.

ACT prints a response "harmonized" or, put another way, a uniform response in all countries attached to the agreement to protect intellectual property (trademarks, designs, patents, books, etc.) and fight, quite vehemently, against any action that under the criteria of an offense involving ACT.

In Spain, as I have happened in other countries that have joined the representatives of the industry are happy with this movement and, of course, users are at the opposite end as ACT can be even worse than the SOUP withdrawal and U.S. law. If SOPA was local to the U.S. (although he is a danger that other countries try to copy the idea and exported to their countries), ACTA to be a global agreement the danger is much greater because encircle many services operating on the network and , as more countries join, the greater the fence. Services like Twitter, YouTube, Google or Wikipedia could be in the crosshairs of this regulatory framework for the simple fact to store or distribute content protected rights.

Now what? Fortunately, not all EU members have signed their accession (Netherlands, Cyprus, Slovakia, Estonia and Germany were left out), a rather important detail when we consider the great weight that Germany within EU (which lately seems to be in control of the Union), in addition to the agreement becomes final is necessary that the Parliament ratifies it, and in the case of approval, it is anticipated that each of the countries members have to transpose the framework within their respective laws and subject to the approval of their parliaments.

That is, in the case of Spain, I fear that we will keep adding laws that restrict freedoms in the network, first with the Sinde Law and ACTA now, what's next?

Picture: CP21