Congress Considers Changes To DMCA

Congress has taken a step toward revising the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which has attracted extensive criticism over the past six years.

A House of Representatives subcommittee convened Wednesday for the first hearing devoted to a proposal to defang the DMCA, a 1998 law that broadly restricts bypassing copy-protection technologies used in DVDs, a few music CDs and some software programs.

Called the Digital Media Consumers’ Rights Act, the amendments are backed by librarians, liberal consumer groups and some technology firms. But they’re bitterly opposed by the entertainment industry, including Hollywood, major record labels and the Business Software Alliance.

Read the full story at CNET News.com.