Slashdot just posted a follow up on the big eBook Arrest
In one of the first cases of criminal prosecution under a 1998 federal digital copyright law [The DMCA], a 27-year-old Russian cryptographer was arrested at a Las Vegas hotel on Monday morning, a day after giving a presentation to a large convention of computer hackers on decrypting the software used to protect electronic books.
Dmitri Sklyarov, who was being held in Las Vegas without bail, is being charged with one count of trafficking in software to circumvent copyrightable materials and one count of aiding and abetting such trafficking.
What he did wrong seems to read like what librarians do every day.
\”Nathanson told me that the real damage done by the AEBPR program is that it creates a \”naked file\” that enables anyone to read the eBook on any computer without paying the feed to the bookseller. Only one legitimate copy of the encrypted eBook needs to be purchased originally and after the protections are stripped through the usage of the Elcomsoft program, there are no restrictions and the eBook can be duplicated freely and made available for usage on any computer.\”
Read The Complaint and see what you think.
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