Press Release
Plan to amend UN Consumer Protection Guidelines to safeguard access to education and culture
14 Sep 2010
- Call comes on 25th Anniversary of UN
Guidelines
- Protections for consumers of digital books, music,
films and software are outdated
- Additional guidelines proposed to prevent companies
from impeding consumers' legal access to education and
culture
Vilnius, Lithuania: At a United Nations (UN)
Internet summit today, Consumers Internationali announced plans to
push for the amendment of the UN Guidelines for Consumer
Protection, to include new safeguards for consumers of goods
protected by copyright and patent laws. Such goods include
e-books, music, films, software, and the devices used for accessing
these.
The global consumer body claims that copyright and patent laws
are often misused by the producers of such goods for reasons that
have little to do with stopping piracy, and more to do with
limiting competition and preventing consumers from making
innovative uses of their products.
Jeremy Malcolm, CI Project Coordinator for IP and
Communications, states:
"DVDs are manufactured with region codes that prevent you
from playing discs that you legally bought overseas. Devices
as diverse as the iPhone, the Amazon Kindle e-book reader, and the
Sony Playstation, have hidden limitations on the use of third-party
content or applications. Works in the public domain, that
should be free for all, are being kept in private hands using
digital locks. Such practices are pervasive across the
industry."
This year is the 25th anniversary of the UN
Guidelines for Consumer Protectionii , which CI helped to
develop. They were last amended in 1999, in response to a
similar CI-led campaign for the inclusion of sustainable
consumption principles. CI itself celebrates its
50th anniversary this year.
Proposed amendments to the Consumer Protection Guidelines will
be developed by CI members worldwide, before being put to
governments for adoption at the UN. Already, some governments
have adopted similar principles in their local laws. Leading
this trend is Brazil, which earlier this year opened consultations
on its new copyright law, which will prohibit companies from using
digital locks to prevent legal uses of works, such as making copies
for education.
Malcolm says:
"For too long, copyright and patent enforcement has been
framed as an issue of 'intellectual property rights', with the
implication that they have a similar status to human rights. But
Consumers International believes the misuse of intellectual
property rights are actually hampering freedom of expression,
education, and participation in cultural life - and governments are
beginning to agree with us."
"We want to re-frame IP enforcement as an issue of consumer
protection. The amendments CI and its members propose to the UN
Guidelines for Consumer Protection will help to catalyse this shift
in thinking. This campaign is about consumers taking back their
rights to access content and to use devices that they have paid
for."