On Oct. 26, 2011, the United States House of Representatives introduced a bill that would grant the U.S. Government greater ability to police the trafficking of copyrighted material over the Internet.
The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), as the bill has been called, would ban search engines from linking to infringing sites, online advertisement companies from conducting business with the sites and supply court orders requiring Internet Service Providers block access to these sites.
SOPA was introduced “to promote prosperity, creativity, entrepreneurship, and innovation by combating the theft of U.S. property, and for other purposes,” according to an excerpt from the bill.
A similar bill called the PROTECT IP Act (PIPA) was introduced on May 12, 2011, and had gained support in the U.S. Senate.
On Jan. 18, 2012, a nation wide protest against SOPA and PIPA took place. Wikipedia, Reddit and other websites coordinated a service blackout or posted links to help raise awareness.
Along with the blackouts, there were many petition drives across the Internet, boycotts of businesses that support the bill and rallies were held in New York, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington D.C.
Two days later, on Jan. 20, 2012, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar S. Smith – who was the chief sponsor of the bill – postponed a vote on the legislation. The vote was to be held on January 24.
“I have heard from the critics and I take seriously their concerns regarding proposed legislation to address the problem of online piracy,” wrote Smith in a written statement from the House. “It is clear that we need to revisit the approach on how best to address the problem of foreign thieves that steal and sell American inventions and products.”
Similarly, PIPA was postponed indefinitely, despite once having widespread, bipartisan support.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said, in a written statement from the Senate, the vote would be postponed “in light of recent events.”