US Senate postpones Tuesday vote on PIPA, SOPA ‘dead’

US Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has postponed a vote on the controversial Protect IP Act (PIPA), scheduled for Tuesday, as a growing number of senators abandinned the controversial copyright enforcement bill.

The lead sponsor of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), a similar bill in the House of Representatives, said Friday the bill is tabled. "It’s dead and not going anywhere," said a spokeswoman for Representative Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican.

But more than 30 senators have come out against the bill in the past week, most of them responding to massive online protests that saw websites likes Wikipedia go offlline for last Wednesday.

"There is no reason that the legitimate issues raised by many about this bill cannot be resolved," Reid said in a statement Friday. "Counterfeiting and piracy cost the American economy billions of dollars and thousands of jobs each year. We must take action to stop these illegal practices."

"Wider agreement" needed

Also on Friday, Smith said he will look for new ways to fight copyright theft. The House Judiciary Committee will table the SOPA "until there is wider agreement on a solution," said Smith, the committee’s chairman.

"I have heard from the critics and I take seriously their concerns regarding proposed legislation to address the problem of online piracy," Smith said in a statement. "It is clear that we need to revisit the approach on how best to address the problem of foreign thieves that steal and sell American inventions and products."

Reid’s decision, and Smith’s statement Friday, are major setbacks for the Motion Picture Association of America and the US Chamber of Commerce, two trade groups that have lead the charge in favor of the bill.

Senator Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat and lead sponsor of PIPA, said he will continue to work on ways to attack foreign websites engaged in the piracy and counterfeiting of US products.

"The day will come when the senators who forced this move will look back and realize they made a knee-jerk reaction to a monumental problem," Leahy said in a statement. "Somewhere in China today, in Russia today, and in many other countries that do not respect American intellectual property, criminals who do nothing but peddle in counterfeit products and stolen American content are smugly watching how the United States Senate decided it was not even worth debating how to stop the overseas criminals from draining our economy."

Threat remains

Christopher Dodd, chairman and CEO at the MPAA, struck a conciliatory tone after Friday’s announcements on PIPA and SOPA, although he said failure to act on the bills leaves a "safe haven" for foreign infringers.

"With today’s announcement, we hope the dynamics of the conversation can change and become a sincere discussion about how best to protect the millions of American jobs affected by the theft of American intellectual property," he said in a statement. "The threat posed by these criminal operations has been widely acknowledged by even the most ardent critics."

SOPA and PIPA would allow the US Department of Justice (DoJ) to seek court orders requiring US online advertising networks and payment processors to stop doing business with foreign websites accused of infringing US copyright. The DoJ could also seek court orders requiring search engines, and possible other sites, to stop linking to the accused websites.

The bills would apply to foreign sites trafficking in pirated music and movies, but also to sites selling counterfeit goods, including handbags, cigarettes, medicine and clothing.

The bills would also allow US copyright holders to seek court orders targeting ad networks and payment processors.

Critics have said the bills would allow copyright holders to flood US Web companies with lawsuits and would allow the DoJ and copyright holders to filter the Internet.

IDG News Service

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