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The jury in a closely watched trial involving the controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act has begun deliberations, after lawyers for Russian software maker ElcomSoft and for the U.S. government gave closing arguments in a San Jose, California, federal court.

ElcomSoft has been charged with one count of conspiracy and four counts of violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the controversial 1998 law that restricts how digital information can be accessed. The Moscow-based company markets a product it developed called Adobe EBook Processor. The software allows users to disable security settings on Adobe electronic-book files so they can be printed, shared, and viewed on various computing devices.

Test Case

The case is historic in that it marks the first time the DMCA has been tested in a criminal trial, said Cindy Cohn, legal director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a public-interest group that has backed ElcomSoft and a programmer for the company, Dmitry Sklyarov, since the start of its legal woes. Cohn attended some of the trial hearings, though the EFF is not representing ElcomSoft in the trial.

If the jury convicts ElcomSoft on the five counts, the company could face as much as $2.5 million in fines.

The DMCA is designed to prevent the distribution of technology that will allow for unsanctioned use of copyrighted materials. It has been tested in a handful of civil cases and has become a point of contention between content producers and technologists.

Public comment is currently being accepted, as the act undergoes a periodic review mandated by law.

Intent Disputed

ElcomSoft has argued all along that its software was not designed to aid copyright infringement. For one, company executives say, the tool can provide legitimate EBook owners "fair use" of their digital files.

"This technology has good uses and it has bad uses ... but [the company] never had any intention to aid infringers," Cohn said.

Sklyarov, who developed the majority of the software for ElcomSoft, also has argued that Adobe's EBook copy-protection technology is flawed. Lawyers for the government aired a deposition of Sklyarov during the trial. He also testified live for the defense on Monday.

"He very much believes, as you will find most security professionals believe, that the way security gets better is if you test and sometimes break other people's security products," Cohn said. "He believes he was participating fully and completely in making security better."

Although ElcomSoft built the software in Russia, where it is not illegal, the company sold the software in the United States beginning in June 2001, which put the case in the jurisdiction of the U.S. court system.

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