The government has drafted legislation that would make it easier for news agencies to contest plagiarism of their reports, drawing cheers from big outlets like Interfax and RIA-Novosti, but critics say the bill is too vague to be effective.

The law, drafted by the Communications and Press Ministry, would extend copyright protection to news reports, with the threat of fines and the possible confiscation of publications to dissuade media from using information without properly attributing its source.

News agencies have long complained that other publications — particularly regional and Internet outlets — plagiarize their reports, but the problem became more pressing amid the financial losses related to the economic crisis.

“A copyright holder has to be protected both from the commercial and intellectual perspective,” Deputy Communications and Press Minister Alexander Zharov said last month after a roundtable of media professionals and government officials.

Zharov said the bill could be submitted to the State Duma when it reconvenes this fall.

Under the new regulations, a media outlet accused of plagiarism could be fined 10,000 rubles ($320) to 20,000 rubles ($645) and have its production confiscated. A reporter or editor could be warned or fined 1,000 rubles to 5,000 rubles, according to a copy of the bill provided by the ministry.

But the legislation still lacks many details, including what state body would levy the fines and confiscate materials or under what circumstances confiscations might occur. It also does not say whether a plagiarist would be fined separately for each instance.

The proposal was largely welcomed by the news media, although lawyers and some outlets warned that the lack of clarity could lead to inefficiency and harassment of smaller rivals.

Mikhail Komissar, chairman of Interfax’s board of directors, said at the roundtable that the concept of the bill was “right” and that “today news agencies’ reports are not protected.”

RIA-Novosti registered 1,608 cases of plagiarism of its exclusive news in the period from January to June, editor Svetlana Mironyuk said after the roundtable.

News agencies lose advertising revenue when a media outlet copies reports without citing the initial source of the news, since readers would not visit their web sites or see advertisements there, said Andrei Afanasyev, deputy head of Interfax’s legal department.

Plagiarism by another media outlet also damages a news agency’s “reputation,” Mironyuk said.

Andrei Richter, head of Moscow’s Media Law and Policy Institute, said the bill was “absolutely necessary” because it made it much easier for news agencies to defend their material from plagiarists.

“Currently, news agencies have to go to court and prove that they have suffered financial losses because of the plagiarism,” Richter said, referring to Part Four of the Civil Code, which currently regulates copyright. “This bill would introduce real administrative responsibility,” he said.

The law would also create a legal framework for the sale of information by news agencies, said Vadim Uskov, a copyright lawyer. Currently, information is not legally classified as “an object of buying and selling,” he said.

“There is a real market, but there is no law to regulate it,” Uskov said. “News agencies exist in a legal vacuum,” he said.

Mironyuk said RIA-Novosti has filed complaints with the Federal Mass Media Inspection Service over what it calls a serial plagiarist of its reports, online newspaper The Moscow Post, but it has not been able to prove its case.

Moscow Post editor Alexei Kozlov called the bill “an opportunity to punish a rival media outlet.”

Kozlov shrugged off Mironyuk’s accusations about plagiarism, saying similar reports stemmed from the fact that correspondents from both outlets were attending “the same news conferences.”

“The Moscow Post is a famous brand, but for a young media outlet it would not be easy to fend off” plagiarism accusations, he said. “It must be decided by a court” whether plagiarism actually took place, as is the case now, Kozlov added.

Legal experts interviewed for this report praised the idea of extending copyright protection to news reports but said the bill still needed work.

Richter was concerned it “wouldn’t work” because it did not say who would issue the fines. Uskov said he “welcomed the idea” of the bill but that its formulation was “controversial.”

The notion of information is spelled out in a “great number” of laws, Uskov said, and it is “necessary to conduct voluminous work” to change information’s legal status. The ministry’s proposed changes “award copyright status to any reports of news agencies,” which “contradicts other parts of the Civil Code,” he said.

“There’s a good chance the law would not work the way it’s meant to,” Uskov said.