Feds Say Hacking DRM To Fix Your Electronics Is Legal

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: The Librarian of Congress and U.S. Copyright Office just proposed new rules that will give consumers and independent repair experts wide latitude to legally hack embedded software on their devices in order to repair or maintain them. This exemption to copyright law will apply to smartphones, tractors, cars, smart home appliances, and many other devices. The move is a landmark win for the 'right to repair' movement; essentially, the federal government has ruled that consumers and repair professionals have the right to legally hack the firmware of 'lawfully acquired' devices for the 'maintenance' and 'repair' of that device. Previously, it was legal to hack tractor firmware for the purposes of repair; it is now legal to hack many consumer electronics.

Specifically, it allows breaking digital rights management (DRM) and embedded software locks for 'the maintenance of a device or system in order to make it work in accordance with its original specifications' or for 'the repair of a device or system to a state of working in accordance with its original specifications.' New copyright rules are released once every three years by the U.S. Copyright Office and are officially put into place by the Librarian of Congress. These are considered 'exemptions' to section 1201 of U.S. copyright law, and makes DRM circumvention legal in certain specific cases. The new repair exemption is broad, applies to a wide variety of devices (an exemption in 2015 applied only to tractors and farm equipment, for example), and makes clear that the federal government believes you should be legally allowed to fix the things you own.

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