The White House released a white paper recommending increasing the penalties for intellectual property crimes. The recommendations involve increasing rights and penalties “so as to more effectively address the substantial harm caused by intellectual property crimes.”
Recommended changes include:
Increase prison term for counterfeit drug distributors;
Increase prison terms for theft of trade secrets;
Increase prison terms for intellectual property offences that risk serious bodily injury;
Clarifying that unlicensed streaming of copyrighted material is a felony;
Providing the federal government with authority to conduct wiretaps when pursuing criminal copyright and trademark offenses; and
Creating a new right of public performance for copyright owners for sound recordings transmitted by over-the-air broadcast station.
To download the white paper goto: http://1.usa.gov/f66NO2