Prometheus 6

New bill lets colleges use federal funds to fight P2P
By Nate Anderson | Published: April 02, 2007 - 07:15AM CT

Representative Ric Keller (R-FL) feels that colleges in America are teaching students more than literature, history, and computer science. They are also dens of thievery, places where students learn to steal "billions of dollars in intellectual property from hardworking people whose jobs hang in the balance." Rep. Keller is talking about illegal file-swapping, of course, and his new bill (HR 1689) could give schools more money to combat the P2P scourge.

The bill is called the "Curb Illegal Downloading on College Campuses Act of 2007." It amends the Higher Education Act, a bill that supplies federal money to universities, allowing that money to be used for programs that reduce illegal downloading of copyrighted content.

The goal is to free up university money that would otherwise be spent on bandwidth costs and to keep networks more secure by keeping out viruses that may attach themselves to P2P files. The bill notes that "computer systems at colleges and universities are intended primarily to aid in educating and increase research capability among students and faculty;" clogging a campus network with BitTorrent traffic does not fall under the school's educational mandate.