Senators Introduce Bill to Fight Websites with Pirated Content

10:13 AM PDT 5/12/2011 by Georg Szalai

UPDATED: Industry groups and unions lauded the Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act (PROTECT IP Act) and a separate bill that would classify illicit online streaming of copyrighted content as a felony.

NEW YORK - Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Judiciary Committee ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-IA) on Thursday introduced a bipartisan bill in the Senate targeting online piracy, particularly so-called rogue websites abroad that offer movies, TV shows and other copyrighted or trademarked content illegally instead of properly licensing content.