Hollywood persuades Norway to prosecute kid for viewing own DVD

THE MOTION PICTURE Association of America (MPAA) has persuaded authorities in the kingdom of Norway to try a teenager three years after he watched DVDs on a Linux computer using the Linux-based de-scrambling program DeCSS. Which he created.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said in a statement that Jon Johansen will face a court tomorrow morning, with the case expected to last the course of this week.

The MPAA, said the EFF, persuaded the Norwegian Economic Crime Unit (ØKOKRIM) to charge Jon Johansen after he used DeCSS when he was only 15 to view a DVD that he owns.

He's charged with breaking a Norwegian law which prohibits people breaking into others' locked property to get data that they're not supposed to obtain. This is the Norwegian Criminal Code section 145(2).

But Johansen owned the DVD, while the law was used in the past to prevent access to banks, telecomms companies, or other systems to look at others' records.

Said Cindy Cohn, the EFF Legal Director: "Jon owned the DVDs and he's never been accused of copyright infringement or assisting in copyright infringement. He's facing criminal charges for taking the necessary steps to view his own DVDs on his own computers."

EFF is helping Johansen fight the case.

The kid used his dad's kit to read the DVD he owned, said the EFF. µ

EFF file