The Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act (CBDTPA) () was a

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

bill proposed in 2002 that would have prohibited any kind of technology that could be used to read digital content without

digital rights management Digital rights management (DRM) is the management of legal access to digital content. Various tools or technological protection measures, such as access control technologies, can restrict the use of proprietary hardware and copyrighted works. DRM ...

(DRM)—which prohibits copying and reading any content under

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive legal right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, ...

without permission of the copyright owner. The bill was known in early drafts as the Security Systems and Standards Certification Act (SSSCA) and was sometimes called the Consume But Don't Try Programming Act.

Legislation

The CBDTPA was proposed by

South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...

senator A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or Legislative chamber, chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the Ancient Rome, ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior ...

Fritz Hollings (D-SC). Senator

Patrick Leahy Patrick Joseph Leahy ( ; born March 31, 1940) is an American politician and attorney who represented Vermont in the United States Senate from 1975 to 2023. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he also was the pr ...

(D-VT), chairman of the

Senate Judiciary Committee The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, informally known as the Senate Judiciary Committee, is a Standing committee (United States Congress), standing committee of 22 U.S. senators whose role is to oversee the United States Departm ...

, had stated that he could "not support" the proposed legislation and, as chairman, intended to block consideration of the controversial bill. This essentially killed the bill in 2002. Proposed penalties for violating the CBDTPA ranged from five to twenty years in

prison A prison, also known as a jail, gaol, penitentiary, detention center, correction center, correctional facility, or remand center, is a facility where Prisoner, people are Imprisonment, imprisoned under the authority of the State (polity), state ...

, and fines between $50,000 and $1 million.

Richard Stallman Richard Matthew Stallman ( ; born March 16, 1953), also known by his initials, rms, is an American free software movement activist and programmer. He campaigns for software to be distributed in such a manner that its users have the freedom to ...

criticized this act due to the restrictions that it would place in the immediate and long-term future on

free software Free software, libre software, libreware sometimes known as freedom-respecting software is computer software distributed open-source license, under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, distribut ...

, dubbing the bill the "Consume But Don't Try Programming Act."{{cite web, first=Richard , last=Stallman , url=https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/can-you-trust.html , title=Can You Trust Your Computer? , publisher=GNU , date=October 2002 , access-date=2009-07-02 Other U.S. senators named as sponsors of the CBDTPA bill include: *

John Breaux John Berlinger Breaux (; born March 1, 1944) is an American lobbyist, attorney, and retired politician from Louisiana. He served in the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives from 1972 to 1987 and as a United State ...

(D-LA) * Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) *

Daniel Inouye Daniel Ken Inouye ( , , September 7, 1924 – December 17, 2012) was an American attorney, soldier, and statesman who served as a United States Senate, United States senator from Hawaii from 1963 until his death in 2012. A Medal of Honor recipi ...

(D-HI) *

Bill Nelson Clarence William Nelson II (born September 29, 1942) is an American politician, attorney, and former astronaut who served from 2001 to 2019 as a United States Senate, United States senator from Florida and from 2021 to 2025 as the Administrator ...

(D-FL) *

Ted Stevens Theodore Fulton Stevens Sr. (November 18, 1923 – August 9, 2010) was an American politician and lawyer who served as a United States Senate, U.S. Senator from Alaska from 1968 to 2009. He was the longest-serving Republican Party (United St ...

(R-AK)

References

External links

Economist article on the January 14, 2003 "truce"

Form to post feedback to the Senate Judiciary Committee, with archived existing comments

The CBDTPA Text

United States federal copyright legislation Proposed legislation of the 107th United States Congress Digital rights management

Legislation

See also

References

External links