Approximately 10,000 people have taken to the streets across Poland in protest of the Polish government’s intention to sign ACTA, the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, reports the BBC.
The goal of ACTA is the introduction of international standards on intellectual property rights enforcement, establishing an international legal framework for countries to join voluntarily.
Opponents of the agreement warn that ACTA will, among other, just like the American SOPA, lead to the censorship of the Internet, as it would impose sanctions forcing Internet service providers to monitor and censor online communications in search of copyrighted material.
To date ACTA has been signed by Australia, Canada, Japan, Korea, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore and the USA, with the countries signing the agreement in October 2011. The European Union has announced its intention to sign the agreement as well.
In January 2012 the Polish government announced its intention to sign ACTA on 26 January 2012.
In response the hacker group Anonymous attacked and shut down several Polish government websites, while several Polish websites blacked out their sites, just like their English-language counterparts did in protest against SOPA. The Polish people have on 25 January 2012, one day before the announced signing of ACTA, taken to the streets across the country to protest the ratification of the Agreement. It is estimated that some 10,000 people participated in the protest.
Picture: Protests against ACTA in Warsaw (source: Wikipedia)
