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Europe Eyes Antitrust Dealings With U.S.
by Winter Casey
U.S. authorities and the European Commission share a common interest and should continue to cooperate on antitrust enforcement, a top European Union official said Friday.
"There is no doubt that that is what the future requires," EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said in a speech before the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. "As markets become more global, and as anti-competitive behavior takes place on an increasingly global scale, so must our competition policy and antitrust enforcement."
Both U.S. and EU antitrust authorities are focused on the best interests of individual consumers, she said. Kroes also noted the importance of cartel enforcement and highlighted her recommendation to increase fines to deter antitrust offenders.
On Tuesday, Kroes defended EU antitrust actions against Microsoft. In a letter to the Financial Times, she said the EU does not have a vendetta against Microsoft.
While the United States settled its antitrust case against the software firm several years ago, Europe has continued to push its case. In 2004, the commission, the EU policymaking arm, fined Microsoft more than $600 million for alleged anti-competitive behavior in the media-player market. The company has appealed the decision. Now the commission is closely following development of Windows Vista, the company's forthcoming computer-operating system.
"Far from pursuing a vendetta against Microsoft, the commission's actions are guided by the desire to create the most innovation-friendly business climate in Europe to the ultimate benefit of European consumers," Kroes said, adding that "there appears to be a coordinated campaign to portray the commission in a negative light."
Copyright Cases From Taiwan To Belgium
Kuro, Taiwan's best-known, unauthorized file-sharing service, on Thursday paid a substantial sum in damages to the recording industry for copyright infringement.
Kuro's operator, Taipei-based Fashion Now, also agreed to close the file-sharing service that was the subject of a lawsuit by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, according to a statement from the group, which represents recording companies.
Kuro plans to launch a legitimate music-downloading Web site, according to IFPI. Under the settlement, Fashion Now will stop distributing its peer-to-peer software program immediately and will close its copyright-infringing service by Oct. 15.
Meanwhile, a Belgian court has ordered Google to stop publishing content from Belgian newspapers without permission or payment of fees. The court found that Google's activities violated a 1994 law on copyright and ancillary rights and a 1998 law on databases.
The Belgian Association of Newspaper Editors, which handles copyright issues for the French- and German-speaking press in the country, filed the complaint against Google.
If the search giant fails to comply with the ruling and continues to publish Belgian newspaper copy without permission and paying a fee, the court will fine the company $1.27 million a day. Google told the Wall Street Journal on Monday that it plans to appeal the decision.
In other intellectual property news, China has revoked 368 business licenses for audiovisual products since mid July for IP infringement, according to China's National Anti-Pornography and Anti-Piracy Office.
China also has destroyed close to 13 million compact discs, digital videodiscs and computer software as part of a statewide campaign against piracy.
New Project To Set Aside African Domain Names
Tralliance, which operates the registry for Internet addresses ending in .travel, announced last week that it is launching a project with the U.N. World Tourism Organization to reserve .travel suffixes for African countries.
Under the Africa Virtual Heritage Management Project, some 4,000 primary African place names -- which include cities, sacred sites, and national parks -- will be registered and initially held in trust by UNWTO for up to five years. During that time, African nations will be able to request the transfer of place names to authorities within their countries in accordance with .travel policies.
All place names from any country left unclaimed by Dec. 31 will be open to commercial travel entities. In response to the deadline, Tralliance said it is working with UNWTO and African travel and tourism organizations to register all African place names by the December deadline.
Meanwhile, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers last week opened the public comment period for a proposal submitted by Tralliance for a "search.travel" search service.
Under the proposal, users who type .travel names that do not exist would be directed to a page that would allow them to register those domain names. ICANN, which manages the Internet-addressing system, said it has referred the proposal to a technical evaluation panel because it raises "significant security and stability issues." The comment period will last until Oct. 18.
Canadian Group Weighs In On Sony Case, Privacy
The Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic on Monday filed an objection to the proposed Canadian settlement of the Sony BMG rootkit class-action lawsuit.
A rootkit is a collection of tools that enables administrator-level access to a computer or computer network. The case stems from allegations that Sony BMG inserted hidden copy-protection software onto dozens of musical compact discs that caused problems for users.
"Sony BMG offers Canadian consumers far less than it offered American consumers in the U.S. class-action settlement, and offered no rational explanation for the different treatment," according to the filing from the clinic, a University of Ottawa law school program aimed at assisting consumer and other public interests in technology-related legal issues. A hearing is scheduled for Thursday.
The clinic also issued a letter to Canadian Internet service providers on Tuesday asking them to adopt a "privacy pledge." The pledge, along with a list of ISPs that have or have not agreed to the statement, will be posted on the Web site OnlineRights.ca.
The clinic said it wants ISPs to refuse to respond to government and law enforcement requests for personal information about users unless the requests are supported by warrant or court orders, or made explicitly under criminal code. The group also is urging ISPs to refrain from collecting personally identifying information about users or from monitoring user content for state purposes unless required. And it has called on ISPs to notify subscribers when they receive legal requests for subscribers' personal information.
In other news, Helen Coonan, Australia's minister for communications, information technology and the arts, said measures will be introduced in parliament to propose changes to media- and foreign-ownership rules, as well as to implement regulatory changes for digital television.
Meanwhile, China's state press reported that five new research institutes will be established by the Chinese Academy of Sciences by 2010 to encourage high-tech growth.
And in Africa, the Mozambique information agency reports that the nation's largest mobile telephone operator, M-cel, on Monday received a license to operate an advanced network for cellular phone technology. M-cel is the first company in Mozambique that will be able to offer the multimedia capacities of the technology.
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