Saying California's economy is threatened by computer-aided piracy, Attorney General Bill Lockyer joined the movie industry Thursday in urging the state Supreme Court to forbid the Internet posting of a program that lets users copy DVDs.
Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Making his second appearance ever before the high court, Lockyer asked the
justices to reject a state appellate court's ruling that a San Francisco man was
exercising free speech when he posted the program in 1999.
Lockyer said the unscrambling program, devised by a Norwegian teenager, was
simply "a burglary tool" designed for "breaking, entering and stealing" a trade
secret -- the industry-owned code designed to prevent unauthorized playback of
movies recorded on digital versatile discs, or DVDs.
The state is taking sides in the private dispute in order to "prevent and
combat piracy . . . encourage investment (and) promote the creative arts,"
Lockyer said. He said the motion picture industry estimates that as many as
350,000 movies are copied illegally every day, and recording companies are
losing billions of dollars from unauthorized copying.
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