Colombia. The Colombian Congress approved on Tuesday night Law 201 of 2012 that regulates, among others, the national and foreign content that must be broadcast on national television, increases intellectual property rights from 30 to 70 years, and imposes sanctions on transmissions of television signals over the Internet that are made without the author's authorization.
The articles, approved within the framework of the law that seeks to implement the Free Trade Agreement signed between Colombia and the United States, generated a harsh controversy in the country because it does not establish clear limits on the control or restriction that could be exercised to the exchange of content on the Internet.
In addition, many say that it is the summarized version of a bill that was processed last year on copyright and Internet content, known as "Lleras Law", alluding to the name of the Minister who presented it, Germán Vargas Lleras, and that was not approved by Congress.
The penalties established by the new Law range from five to eight years in prison for people who violate copyright. But the controversy is not only about the restrictions and sanctions, there are also experts who say that what has been approved may go against current rules and that vices could also be found so that they would not pass the constitutional review.
For its part, the Colombian government, headed by Interior Minister Germán Vargas Lleras, said that "the rules contained in the project such as copyright are things that are already in force in Colombia and it is not true that it penalizes Internet users."
