EU lawmakers and governments agreed to remove the final roadblock...

said. The sticking point had been the power of network providers to cut off Internet service without a court order, under the “three-strikes” approach being discussed in France (CD April 1 p4). The compromise includes binding provisions requiring any measures taken regarding users’ access to electronic communications services and applications or use of the them to respect their fundamental rights and freedoms such as the right to privacy, freedom of expression and access to information, as well as the “right to a judgment by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law and acting in respect of due process,” the committee said. It asked the European Commission to study the Internet’s role in exercising fundamental rights, it said. The agreement won support from Council representatives Wednesday. It goes to second-reading vote during parliamentary plenary session Monday to Thursday. The new text isn’t likely to stop France’s controversial “Creation and Internet” law, known as the HADOPI, digital rights activists said. The French measure would create a three-strikes system -- or “graduated response” -- to digital piracy, requiring ISPs to notify and warn suspected infringers and sets up an agency that can order temporary suspension of Internet access as a last resort. The HADOPI won Senate approval but was defeated April 9 in the National Assembly. A revised measure, which leaves the graduated response essentially intact, is in second reading in the Assembly, said Philippe Aigrain, the Society for Public Information Spaces’ CEO.