Stop ACTA

In a week following widespread Internet protests against proposed legislation in the U.S., there is an effort going on internationally to protest the potential effects of ACTA. The OTW is concerned about this treaty which has potentially large implications but about which there has been very little information. "In October 2007, the United States, the European Community, Switzerland, and Japan simultaneously announced that they would negotiate a new intellectual property enforcement treaty the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement or ACTA. Australia, the Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Mexico, Jordan, Morocco, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and Canada have joined the negotiations."

"The main problem with this treaty is that all the negociations are done secretly. Leaked documents show that one of the major goals of the treaty is to force signatory countries into implementing anti file-sharing policies under the form of three-strikes schemes and net filtering practices."

Tell your MEPs and government representatives you want more transparency before this is voted on. Here are some places where you can take action:

• Help sign the Written Declaration about ACTA
• Direct.Gov's UK petition
• Whitehouse.Gov's US petition
• E-petition (Deutsch)
• Suggested guidelines for contacting representatives