Reasoning of the Law

When it comes to copyright in general, one must first understand what a copyright violation is. “Anyone who uses copyrighted material without permission is violating the Copyright Act. To prove a violation, the plaintiff must present evidence that the work was original”.(Beatty,507) These laws were first adopted by America from statues set forth by Queen Ann in the 18th Century. “More than 300 years ago, on April 10, 1710, Queen Anne of England approved the first copyright statute. Called the Statute of Anne, it provided copyright protection for 14 years.” (Beatty, 506) In your particular case, copyright has had a grand evolution. Unlike photographers of the past, with the birth of the internet and the digital age of photography, stricter and more detailed laws had to be set forth for your protection. “One of the major challenges for legal institutions in regulating copyrights is simply that modern intellectual property is so easy to copy.” (Beatty 508) The photographers of today still have the protection of the original copyright laws of the United States  but they have the added security while publishing their media on the internet through digital means from people stealing their work, or deleting their copyright information digitally. “Congress passed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) which provides that: It is illegal to delete copyright information, such as the name of the author or the title of the article.” (Beatty,509) The DMCA is the best case law in the last century as far as digital protection it provides several protections. “It is illegal to distribute tools and technologies used to circumvent encryption devices. If you help others to copy that software program, you have violated the statute” (Bailey,509) Also, if you encrypt your work and someone circumvents that digitally, it is still a violation of the MDCA. “It is illegal to distribute tools and technologies used to circumvent encryption devices. If you help others to copy that software program, you have violated the statute.” (Beatty, 509) For your line of work, the MDCA should be your first point of reference.