It seemed like such a good idea at the time.

Dec 17, 2006

Arizona Senator John McCain has proposed legislature which, ostensibly, would help law enforcement officials track online sexual predators.

On the surface, this sounds all well and good, even an excellent idea. Just about every society agrees with the statement that sexual predation is a bad thing, and sexual predation of children is an extremely bad thing. The implementation of the proposed legislation, however, is a bit worrisome. The definition of the sites responsible for purging material, and the data that must be retained, is more than a bit vague, while the penalties are fairly draconian.

Any web site that allows user participation (blogs, forums, chat rooms) and which collects user data would be required to submit reports of aggregate user activity, retain data, and allow that data to be searched on demand of US federal officials. All such sites would also be required to report any offensive behavior on their site, and retain all data relating to the circumstances for six months. Internet service providers — including hosting companies, so including me — are already required to do this. This new legislation would extend that responsibility to any site that could be considered a social networking site: blogs; forums; tag boards requiring registration; anything that allows user participation and requires membership to participate.

Text taken from Think Progress:

– Commercial websites and personal blogs “would be required to report illegal images or videos posted by their users or pay fines of up to $300,000.”

– Internet service providers (ISPs) are already required to issue such reports, but under McCain’s legislation, bloggers with comment sections may face “even stiffer penalties” than ISPs.

— Social networking sites will be forced to take “effective measures” — such as deleting user profiles — to remove any website that is “associated” with a sex offender. Sites may include not only Facebook and MySpace, but also Amazon.com, which permits author profiles and personal lists, and blogs like DailyKos, which allows users to sign up for personal diaries.

This would apply to sites that allowed membership, whether those sites require payment for the membership or not. As I said previously, this initially sounds like a very good idea, and one that almost everyone can agree with on the surface: stop online sexual predation and online sexual abuse of minors. However, how far will this law go? What requirements will be placed upon site owners? And, again, what’s the definition of obscenity? According to CNet, a man in Alabama has been indicted and accused of being a child pornographer. There is no evidence that he has ever taken photos of unclothed minors. The accusation of child pornography came about because of the argument that his models “struck poses that were illegally provocative” (full text here). I have not seen the photos in question; and if anecdotal evidence is accurate there is plenty of “borderline” activity happening in the world of teen modelling. However, the definition of obscenity has always been a moving target, defined by community standards. Now, with the changing sociopolitical climate in the US, and the growing recognition of online communities as communities in and of themselves, it’s not inconceivable that one day sites which host discussions about family planning and lifestyle options, religious and philosophical debates, even the screaming matches and flame wars may be forced to close their doors because the owners are either unable to keep up with the cost of educating themselves about online obscenity and reporting requirements, but because the topics themselves are declared obscene. Note: there was a comment made on another site that calls out Declan McCullagh for inaccurately relaying information about legislative proposals. This does not negate the fact that such a law would place a burden on individual site owners when the ones who need to be removing content that breaks the law are the ones who are already legally required to do so: communities like MySpace, LiveJournal, Blogger/Blogspot, Facebook, and their ilk; web hosting providers; and internet service providers. The fact that a site allows a user to create a profile page or a list of life goals should not automatically make the owners of all such sites responsible for policing content.

Keywords: | technology | laws | Holidailies |
Posted by Laughing Muse • 592 views • Share this link • Newer • Older