Stanford Law dean battles DeCSS

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) says the dean of Stanford Law School will join the defense team for a hacker magazine in an Internet free-speech and copyright lawsuit. Kathleen Sullivan, a law professor at Stanford and founder of the Stanford Center for Internet Society, will argue the case May 1 in the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York.

The case targets underground hacker magazine 2600, which posted DeCSS, a program that makes it possible to decrypt DVD security, in November 1999. The Motion Picture Association of America sued 2600 last year, alleging the magazine violated copyrights by publishing code that could potentially enable people to copy movies. A federal judge agreed and banned 2600 from linking to or posting the code. The EFF, which represents the magazine, appealed the case in January.