Rep. Lamar Smith plans to remove DNS blocking from SOPA

House Judiciary Committee chairman Rep. Lamar Smith says he plans to remove the controversial DNS blocking provision from the Stop Online Piracy Act, according to a statement released on his website today. Smith says that he feels “we should remove Domain Name System blocking from the Stop Online Piracy Act so that the committee can further examine the issues surrounding this provision,” and that “we will continue to look for ways to ensure that foreign websites cannot sell and distribute illegal content to US consumers.” If the removal of DNS blocking actually takes place, and holds, it would be an enormous victory for SOPA opponents that have been rallying in recent weeks to protest the bill. But there are still components of SOPA that are troublesome and controversial, and without seeing Smith’s exact amendments we can’t know for sure whether the worst parts have been eliminated.