EFF Objects to Rule for CO Online System for Designating DMCA Claim Agents

it had completed development of the online designation system and planned to deploy it in December (see 1610310050). The final rule for the designation system could expose website owners “to massive risk of copyright liability simply for neglecting to submit an online form on time,” EFF Activist Elliot Harmon said in a blog post: “The rule could eliminate the safe harbor status that thousands of websites receive” under DMCA Section 512. To receive Section 512’s safe harbor protections, websites must designate agents to receive infringement claim notices. The final rule for the online designation system requires all website owners to re-register their agents by the end of 2017 and to renew their registration every three years, the CO said in a notice in Tuesday’s Federal Register. “When website owners inevitably forget to renew, copyright holders will be able to take advantage of that mistake to hold them liable for their users’ infringing activities,” Harmon said. “It will be trivial for abusive copyright holders to use the Copyright Office’s own system to compile lists of sites at risk.” The rule change will disproportionately affect small companies and nonprofits, “the same groups that are most poorly poised to fight copyright infringement suits,” Harmon said. He said the section "already imposes a long list of conditions on service providers, and we’ve seen many well-meaning service providers lose their status over technicalities. Requiring providers to commit to updating their registrations indefinitely is a step too far.”