For the first time yesterday, the European Parliament expressed its opinion on a bill formulated by ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement). Result: the proposed anti-piracy law was rejected with 478 votes against, 39 in favor and 165 abstentions.
The proposed treaty was intended to standardize international laws governing intellectual property to discourage online piracy and counterfeiting. Record companies could have acted on their own, and national authorities would have had more criminal and judicial power with the consequence of increased controls and censorship of content posted online.
However, it was not only the European parliamentarians who spoke out against the law, but also the citizens: the European Parliament received 2,8 million signatures to reject the law.
And in Italy? If the law proposed by ACTA had passed, the Italian Parliament could have re-introduced the Fava law (the "gag law", proposed in February last year but immediately rejected in the Chamber, ed).
