There is recourse against truly false claims made in bad faith, but it's not the penalty of perjury part. All you swear under penalty of perjury is that you are authorized to act on behalf of the owner of some copyright allegedly infringed (i.e. you're not filing a claim about someone else's work).
Here's the actual recourse created by the bill:
> (f) MISREPRESENTATIONS- Any person who knowingly materially misrepresents under this section-- (1) that material or activity is infringing, or (2) that material or activity was removed or disabled by mistake or misidentification, shall be liable for any damages, including costs and attorneys' fees, incurred by the alleged infringer, by any copyright owner or copyright owner's authorized licensee, or by a service provider, who is injured by such misrepresentation, as the result of the service provider relying upon such misrepresentation in removing or disabling access to the material or activity claimed to be infringing, or in replacing the removed material or ceasing to disable access to it.
Note that the EFF is trying to prosecute a case over this clause [1]. IANAL, but it seems to be hard to hold someone responsible for a bad DMCA notice unless they specifically knew that it was bad (rather than merely being sloppy and sending notices without adequately considering fair use). Whether that is the case for this notice could theoretically be found out through discovery.
Comments
There is recourse against truly false claims made in bad faith, but it's not the penalty of perjury part. All you swear under penalty of perjury is that you are authorized to act on behalf of the owner of some copyright allegedly infringed (i.e. you're not filing a claim about someone else's work).
Here's the actual recourse created by the bill:
> (f) MISREPRESENTATIONS- Any person who knowingly materially misrepresents under this section-- (1) that material or activity is infringing, or (2) that material or activity was removed or disabled by mistake or misidentification, shall be liable for any damages, including costs and attorneys' fees, incurred by the alleged infringer, by any copyright owner or copyright owner's authorized licensee, or by a service provider, who is injured by such misrepresentation, as the result of the service provider relying upon such misrepresentation in removing or disabling access to the material or activity claimed to be infringing, or in replacing the removed material or ceasing to disable access to it.
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c105:6:./temp/~c105aLN...:
Note that the EFF is trying to prosecute a case over this clause [1]. IANAL, but it seems to be hard to hold someone responsible for a bad DMCA notice unless they specifically knew that it was bad (rather than merely being sloppy and sending notices without adequately considering fair use). Whether that is the case for this notice could theoretically be found out through discovery.
[1] https://www.eff.org/cases/lenz-v-universal