This was a red-letter week for EFF, with three critical victories coming each on the heels of the last:
* Under pressure from EFF and a broad, bipartisan coalition of
organizations we led, the U.S. Forest Service announced that
it would drop plans to block messages from web action centers.* The Dutch Supreme Court upheld a lower court decision protecting
peer-to-peer software provider KaZaA from liability under Dutch
law for copyright infringement by its users. EFF’s Fred von
Lohmann will argue a similar appeal in the MGM v. Grokster case
in January, and while the European law is different, the decision
provides a positive context within which to argue that the higher
court should uphold our victory before the lower court last
Spring.* Finally, the DC Circuit ruled Friday to uphold Verizon’s right
to protect its customers’ privacy from subpoenas issued by the
Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) under the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). EFF helped lead a coalition of
44 privacy and consumer groups, plus a host of ISPs, in an amicus
brief in support of Verizon.
A reminder: EFF is a member-supported charity — and you’ve got just over a week left to throw some money at a worthy charity before Uncle Sugar will take it away from you.