Copyright-protected audio, audiovisual, video game, journalistic and editorial content disseminated on electronic communication networks.

‘Draft proposals to amend the regulation concerning the protection of copyright on electronic communication networks and implementation procedures in accordance with Legislative Decree No 70 of 9 April 2003, as referred to in Resolution No 680/13/CONS and subsequent amendments’, approved by Resolution No 540/20/CONS

Resolution No 540/20/CONS adopts draft amendments to the ‘Regulation concerning the protection of copyright on electronic communication networks and implementation procedures in accordance with Legislative Decree No 70 of 9 April 2003’ as referred to in Resolution No 680/13/CONS (hereinafter also the ‘Regulation’) and submits it for public consultation, in order to allow all stakeholders to express their opinion.

The Regulation was adopted by the Authority on 12 December 2013 and entered into force on 14 March 2014, following a comprehensive public consultation. It takes into account the observations made by the European Commission as part of notification procedure No 2013/0496/I.

Subsequent notification procedure No 2018/0151/I then reported the amendments made to the same Regulation following the entry into force of Law No 167 of 20 November 2017, containing ‘Provisions for the fulfilment of obligations deriving from Italy's membership of the European Union - European Law 2017’, which extended the Authority's powers regarding the protection of online copyright.

The amendment that concerns us today and which we hereby intend to notify the European Commission of, pursuant to Directive (EU) 2015/1535, refers to the changes made to the Regulation by Resolution No 540/20/CONS, made necessary under the regulatory provisions of Law No 77 of 17 July 2020 and, in particular, Article 195-bis, entitled ‘Provisions on the protection of copyright’. This provision extends the scope of AGCOM's powers regarding the protection of online copyright to also include ‘information society service providers who use, for this purpose, even indirectly, national numbering resources’.

The parties classified as such are identifiable by virtue of the provisions of Law No 124/17, which introduced the obligation, as later set out by the Decree of the Minister for Economic Development of 5 March 2018, for them to register in the Register of Communication Operators (Registro degli operatori della comunicazione - ROC) maintained by the Authority.

These parties fall within the scope of the Regulation, which has been amended with the aim of adapting the pre-existing provisions (which were the subject of previous notification procedures) to them as well.

The proposed amendments are listed on page 8 of Resolution No 540/20/CONS.