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Long title | Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act |
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Acronyms (colloquial) | COICA |
Nicknames | Senate Bill S.3804 |
Codification | |
Titles amended | Chapter 113 of Title 18 of the United States Code |
Legislative history | |
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United States Senate Bill S.3804, known as the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA) was a bill introduced by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) on September 20, 2010. It proposed amendments to Chapter 113 of Title 18 of the United States Code that would authorize the Attorney General to bring an in rem action against any domain name found "dedicated to infringing activities," as defined within the text of the bill. Upon bringing such an action, and obtaining an order for relief, the registrar of, or registry affiliated with, the infringing domain would be compelled to "suspend operation of and lock the domain name."[1]
The bill was supported by the Motion Picture Association of America, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Screen Actors Guild, Viacom, and the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts of the United States.[1]
It was opposed by organizations and individuals such as Center for Democracy and Technology, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Demand Progress, the Distributed Computing Industry Association,[1] Tim Berners-Lee, the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch.[2]
The bill passed the Senate Judiciary Committee with a vote of 19-0 but never received a full vote on the Senate floor.[1] Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) announced he would take the steps necessary to halt COICA so it is not enacted into law in 2010, and was successful, effectively killing this bill and requiring it to be resubmitted and for it to make it through a new committee again in 2011 with a different makeup of its members.[3] The Act was rewritten as the Protect IP Act.