“The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), an online civil
liberties group, today said it has petitioned a federal appeals
court to overturn a lower court’s interpretation of the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). The group said in a statement that
the decision created an unconstitutional restraint on free
expression.”
“The banned information is a computer program called DeCSS that
decrypts the data contained on DVDs… The program is designed to
prevent copyright infringement, but the court held that publishing
DeCSS was illegal even when no infringement had occurred and
despite the fact that it was being used for legitimate,
constitutionally protected purposes, EFF said.”
“Emmanuel Goldstein, editor-in-chief of 2600 Magazine, said in
the statement, “The anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA
threaten the media’s ability to point the public to truthful
information. The First Amendment has always protected such
publication.”