Europe 'will not accept' three strikes in ACTA treaty

The European Commission has pledged to make sure the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) will not force countries to disconnect people for unlawfully downloading copyrighted music, movies and other material.

The assurance from the office of the trade commissioner, Karel De Gucht, is the strongest statement on ACTA to emerge from the new Commission since it took office earlier in February. ACTA negotiations, which have been taking place since 2007, aim to create a new global intellectual-property enforcement regime that builds on the 1994 Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs). Much of ACTA is taken up with trademark protection and counterfeit goods, but the draft text also has a section on online copyright protection, according to published summaries.