A Republican senator who moonlights as a composer of hymns and soft rock ballads has called for the development of new technology to remotely destroy computers belonging to illegal music downloaders.
Orrin Hatch later rowed back from his controversial comments after they prompted protests on technology weblogs and news sites.
His original remarks came on Tuesday during a hearing of the Senate judiciary committee, which he chairs, on copyright abuses.
During a discussion on methods to frustrate computer users who illegally exchange music and movie files over the internet, he asked technology executives about ways to damage computers involved in such file trading. Legal experts have said any such attack would violate federal anti-hacking laws.
"No one is interested in destroying anyone's computer," replied Randy Saaf of MediaDefender, a secretive Los Angeles company that builds technology to disrupt music downloads. One technique deliberately downloads pirated material very slowly so other users cannot access it.
"I'm interested," Senator Hatch interrupted. He said damaging someone's computer "may be the only way you can teach somebody about copyrights".
He acknowledged Congress would have to enact an exemption for copyright owners from liability for damaging computers. He endorsed technology that would twice warn a computer user about illegal online behaviour, "then destroy their computer".
"If we can find some way to do this without destroying their machines, we'd be interested in hearing about that," he said. "If that's the only way, then I'm all for destroying their machines. If you have a few hundred thousand of those, I think people would realise" the seriousness of their actions, he said.
"There's no excuse for anyone violating copyright laws," the senator added.
Yesterday Senator Hatch published on his official Senate website a clarification to his statements to the committee, saying that he does not favour "extreme remedies" unless no moderate remedies can be found.
"I made my comments [...] because I think that industry is not doing enough to help us find effective ways to stop people from using computers to steal copyrighted, personal or sensitive materials. I do not favour extreme remedies - unless no moderate remedies can be found. I asked the interested industries to help us find those moderate remedies," the statement read.
The senator earned $18,000 (£10,700) last year in songwriting royalties. Among the nine CDs available on his music website are America United, Heal Our Land and How His Glory Shines.
A spokesman for the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), Jonathan Lamy, said Senator Hatch was "apparently making a metaphorical point that if peer-to-peer networks don't take reasonable steps to prevent massive copyright infringement on the systems they create, Congress may be forced to consider stronger measures".
