Prosecution Appeal Against DVD Jon Rejected

The copyright industry can add another significant loss to their campaign, as a Norwegian Court has rejected the prosecutions request for an appeal against DVD Jon.

The last few weeks have not faired well for the copyright industry. Initial failure came when a Canadian court ruled that P2P downloading was legal (although uploading is not.) Then came the important decision in Amsterdam, where the Dutch Supreme Court ruled that Kazaa’s developer cannot be held responsible for the actions of its users.

The industry bombshell came on Friday, when the United States Court of Appeals rejected the RIAA’s argument that Verizon is obligated to hand over the identities of suspected file-traders under the DMCA.

Now, Prosecutors from Norway’s Economic Crime Unit, puppeteered by the United State’s MPAA, have lost yet another significant battle in the ongoing copyright wars. From Aftenposten.no:

“A panel of judges Monday cast aside the appeal that prosecutors had filed to a lower court decision handed down in January. That means the lower court’s decision will stand, at least until another eventual appeal takes the case to Norway’s supreme court.”

The verdict was yielded today by Judge Wenche Skjeggestad.

The argument from the prosecution’s point of view centers on DeCSS. To understand DeCSS is to know what CSS is. CSS, or Content Scrambling System, is an encryption system used to protect DVDs from being copied.

DeCSS removes this encryption. However, its origins began innocently enough. Jon Lech Johansen (DVD Jon) created DeCSS so that he could watch DVDs on his Linux machine. At the time, no player existed that would allow DVDs to play on Linux boxes. Over time, DeCSS evolved into something significantly different than its pristine origins, however DVD Jon cannot be held responsible for its use (much like Verizon cannot be held responsible for P2P traffic on its network.)

Of course, the prosecution may appeal to the Norwegian Supreme Court, however no indication of this has been made public. Considering the near global swing of favor away from the copyright industry, such a move may not be wise. Aside from legislative changes, most Supreme Court rulings become nation wide policy.