Paris, June 16, 2015. Press release.
Today the legal affairs (JURI) Committee of the European Parliament destroyed most of the measures on DRMs in Reda Report on Copyright by way of amendments before adopting it by a large majority. Key paragraphs have been wiped out.
The original Reda report was welcomed by April [6] as an important first step toward re-balancing European regulations on copyright, especially regarding DRMs and interoperability. However, it had been under fire, and many amendments were tabled to empty it from any interesting proposals [7]. Most of those on April's core issues such as DRMs passed, making the Reda report much weaker.
This trend was especially strong with paragraph 24, which conditioned legal protection of the DRMs to the publication of their source code or interface specifications, hence creating an actual right to interoperate with the technological measures. This paragraph was simply deleted.
"With paragraph 24 Julia Reda's intention was to create an effective right to technical measures interoperability", concluded Frédéric Couchet, executive director at April. "Unfortunately, 'thanks' to Jean-Marie Cavada and others MEPs, this paragraph has been wiped out. Controlling, imposing restrictions, jailing are methods which still elicit complacency from the MEPs, who were incapable of suggesting ways to enhance the initial proposition on DRM".
A more detail analysis of the report, especially regarding other issues, will soon be published by April.