Knowledgebase

Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a United States copyright law that implements two 1996 WIPO treaties.

It criminalizes the production and dissemination of technology, devices, or services that are used to circumvent measures that control access to copyrighted works (commonly known as DRM) and criminalizes the act of circumventing access control, even when there is no infringement of copyright itself.

DMCA also heightens the penalties for copyright infringement on the Internet. Passed on October 8, 1998, by a unanimous vote in the United States Senate and signed into law by President Bill Clinton on October 28, 1998, the DMCA amended Title 17 of the U.S. Code to extend the reach of copyright, while limiting the liability of Online Providers from copyright infringement by their users. On May 22, 2001, the European Union passed the EU Copyright Directive or EUCD, similar in many ways to the DMCA.

Our DMCA policy can be found at http://www.westhost.com/policies/ under "DMCA Policy"