A controversial bill that would limit access to adult material on the Web cleared a House subcommittee on Thursday. Legal experts say the Child Online Protection Act, (HR3783) is more likely to withstand constitutional scrutiny than the Communications Decency Act (CDA), which was unanimously overturned by the Supreme Court.
The bill, introduced by Representatives Michael Oxley (R-Ohio) and James Greenwood (D-Pennsylvania), moves to the Commerce Committee for action following Thursday's voice vote by the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade, and Consumer Protection.
Similar to legislation pending in the Senate -- dubbed CDA II -- the House bill would restrict the distribution of Internet content deemed "harmful to minors," a narrower definition than the CDA's "indecency" standard. But free speech advocates are still disturbed by its implications.
"The legislative solutions ... repeat the mistakes of the CDA," said Jerry Berman, executive director of the Center for Democracy and Technology at the subcommittee's hearing on Internet pornography last week.
"They fail to take into account the special aspects of this potentially powerful medium," said Berman, who urged the committee to study the legal and technological issues in greater depth before passing legislation.
A spokeswoman for Rep. Michael Oxley (R-OH), co-author of the legislation, says the bill does not restrict online content. "We're only saying that if a Web site contains materials inappropriate to minors, it must have an adult verification system in place," said Peggy Peterson.
The bill has been lengthened from its original version to include, among other things, protections for Internet service providers that merely transmit data. It also includes a defense clause for adult-content providers when minors evade the verification process.
Congress is asking the National Telecommunications and Information Administration to explore the possibility of creating an adult domain, such as .xxx under the .us top-level country domain. The administration is a division of the Commerce Department.
We've tried to do this in a responsible and constitutional manner," Peterson said. "The harmful-to-minors standard is a three-prong test. The Starr Report would certainly be considered legally protected speech under this bill. If they're not selling pornography to minors, they have nothing to be scared about."
At last week's Internet pornography hearing, Harvard Law School professor Lawrence Lessig testified that the real danger of passing legislation at this point is that it could have a chilling effect on emerging technologies. He said technology, such as digital certificate architecture, might better address the problem of children accessing inappropriate materials on the Internet.
Lessig also questioned the legitimacy of current verification systems, which often require credit card information.
"Why would anyone be required to turn over their financial records to someone you wouldn't even want to talk to on the street?" he asked the committee. "The last people we should require people to turn over their credit card information to so that they can gain access to free speech are the purveyors of online pornography."
