Tech industry wants US-style copyright rules in UK trade deal
Big tech firms including Facebook, Google, and Amazon want US-style safe harbour protections from copyright liability enshrined in any US-UK free trade agreement (FTA).
The Internet Association UK, a trade body which also includes Dropbox, eBay, and Microsoft, published its “digital trade priorities for a US-UK FTA” last week.
The UK currently faces something of a crossroads in terms of its IP policy, as it prepares to drop some of the EU’s policies in areas like geographical indications (GIs).
Boris Johnson’s government is under pressure from the US to drop EU-style GI labelling requirements for food and drink products as part of any US-UK FTA.
But tech companies also want to see exemptions from copyright liability included in any free trade deal.
In its document, the Internet Association argued for the importance of liability protections and “innovation oriented copyright” modelled on the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
An overbroad regime of strong copyright protection and enforcement—without limitations
and exceptions like the ‘fair use’ of copyrighted material—would stifle the internet economy,” the document said.
Tech companies also want to see the potential for hefty damages awards for copyright infringement curbed.
“Copyright damage regimes—if not properly calibrated—can have a stifling effect on innovation and legitimate services, especially smaller providers and emerging services,” the Internet Association claimed.
The trade body also argued that the risk of “significant damages can deter startups from developing new technologies,” citing emerging tech like artificial intelligence.
Many of the companies in the Internet Association, especially Google, were also opposed to the EU Copyright Directive.
After the final text of the now-adopted Copyright Directive was published last February, Google’s senior vice president Kent Walker wrote that it marked “one step forward, two steps back” for Europe’s creative economy.
In particular, Google objected to provisions in the directive requiring online platforms to pay for snippets of news content, as well as greater liability for copyright infringement.
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