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The Great Firewall of China has been of largely academic interest to most Americans — until now. Legislation has been introduced in both houses of Congress to allow the US government to unilaterally censor foreign websites that it decides are hosting unlicensed content. While nominally targeted at “pirate” sites, the language –particularly of the House version — is so broad it could be used to shut down access to almost any international website, especially since every social network and sharing site is littered with homebrew videos featuring unlicensed soundtracks.
The Senate judiciary committee unanimously passed its version of the so-called PROTECT IP act (full text of the PROTECT IP Act), which is currently being held up by Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon. The House has, in the meantime, charged ahead with an even more aggressive version it has titled the Enforcing and Protecting American Rights Against Sites Intent on Theft and Exploitation Act, or E-PARASITES in short (full text of the E-PARASITES Act). The House version requires service providers to actively block — a polite word for censor — sites which are deemed to be infringing. Mike Masnick of TechDirt was quick to point out that this would in effect create a Great Firewall of America.
Protests by the internet community – including a letter from 87 internet pioneers and developers – over the expected impact of the Senate bill apparently fell on deaf ears, as the House version is even broader, expanding the targeted sites from those sites ”dedicated to infringing activities” to include those with “only limited purposes other than infringement” and those which “induce infringement.” Service providers bear the brunt of enforcement, being required to “take technically feasible and reasonable measures designed to prevent access by its subscribers located in the United States to the foreign infringing site…” — even including blocking IP address lookup of the targeted domains.
More chilling, the legislation provides that the Attorney General can take action against anyone offering a product or service designed or marketed to get around this new blacklist. Popular services like Tor would be immediately threatened by passage of this bill.
The Senate’s proposed PROTECT IP act has been criticized by other countries for attempting to impose US law in other jurisdictions, but the E-PARASITES version goes even further and should be of concern to everyone in the US who values freedom of access on the internet. Critics are all in agreement that more steps need to be taken to prevent online piracy, but are opposed to those that come at the expense of the openness of the internet. The New York Times offered a perspective on what it would take to fix these bills, so that online piracy can be effectively battled without sacrificing individual liberties.
Estados Unidos liberó el programa "E-PARASITES" (''Enforcing and Protecting American Rights Against Sites Intent on Theft and Exploitation Act''), antes denominado "PROTECT IP", que promete convertirse en el gran firewall a nivel mundial de la Internet. El proyecto se encuentra en proceso de aprobación y le daría la opción al Gobierno estadounidense de otorgar permisos a dueños de páginas con ''copyright'' de eliminar cualquier página, ya sea nacional o extranjera que viole sus derechos de autor. Además obligaría a los infractores en un plazo de cinco días cerrar el sitio web y de no hacerlo serían procesados por el delito de desacato.

A tan solo pocas horas del comunicado, una carta firmada por miles de internautas –incluidos 87 técnicos reconocidos a nivel mundial–, fue dirigida al Gobierno de Estados Unidos, pues alegan que es un "intento de censura a nivel mundial".

Este proyecto según expertos, se asemeja al "Gran cortafuegos de China", el cual censura miles de páginas que "afecten el orden público e inciten al derrocamiento del gobierno".

El proceso de castigo a los infractores sería el siguiente
* El titular de los derechos de autor acusa a una web que cree infractora.
* Un fiscal emite una carta a los proveedores.
* Los proveedores deben bloquear el acceso a la misma así como eliminar cualquier operación financiera o económica de terceros sobre el sitio en un plazo de cinco días.

Miguel Jorge, un experto en informática, afirma que lo más preocupante "es que el programa abarca a todo el Mundo, saliéndose de la jurisdicción estadounidense".