Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)

• Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology and for Law and Justice Ravi Shankar Prasad was locked out of his Twitter account for an hour allegedly over a notice received for violation of the DMCA Act.
• The DMCA oversees the implementation of two 1996 treaties signed by World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) member nations.

What is the DMCA and how does it ensure implementation of the WIPO treaties?

• The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or DMCA, is a 1998 law passed in the US and is among the world’s first laws recognising intellectual property on the internet.
• WIPO members had in December 1996 agreed upon two treaties, namely the WIPO Copyright Treaty and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty.
• Both the treaties require member nations and signatories to provide in their respective jurisdictions, protection to intellectual property that may have been created by citizens of different nations who are also co-signatories to the treaty.
• It also obligates that signatories to the treaty ensure ways to prevent circumvention of the technical measures used to protect copyrighted work.
• It also provides the necessary international legal protection to digital content.

What is WIPO and how does it ensure protection of content on the internet?

• WIPO is one of the oldest specialised agencies of United Nations.
• WIPO was created in 1967 ""to encourage creative activity, to promote the protection of intellectual property throughout the world"".
• WIPO currently administers 26 international treaties.
• It is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland.
• As of date, 193 nations across the world, including India, are members of WIPO.
• India joined WIPO in 1975.
• Every year World Intellectual Property Day is being celebrated on 26th April.

Intellectual Property:

• Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect, and primarily encompasses copyrights, patents and trademarks.
• It also includes other types of rights, such as trade secrets, publicity rights, moral rights, and rights against unfair competition."