This is old news, so I don't mind putting it on the web. This is for history purpose, since the CDA was defeated in the Supreme Court.

Dan DeSalvo

January 22, 1997

Censorship of the Internet


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The first time I went on the Internet, that massive group of computer networks that is so complex it is called a web, I was surprised at what I found. Page after page I saw small graphics of blue ribbons, proclaiming free speech on the Internet. The Blue Ribbon Campaign was just one of the many organizations fighting for freedom on the Internet.

Free speech has not been a luxury that all people could have. Many countries have governments that do not allow free speech. "[The Internet]...could have been, and still can be, our legacy to the global communications infrastructure - exporting the glories of the First Amendment, granting citizens of all nations the experience of speaking without fear"(Levy 53). Because of freedom of speech in this country, and because the Internet is not censored, people in other countries can make use of the United States' First Amendment.

Sitthi Surijamorn, an engineering student at Assumption University in Thailand, says the Internet is filling a void. "Since the Internet can offer unlimited access to the rest of the World from one's own living room, it is the only means so far to get around the government control." (Hamilton B1)

The Internet has been a forum of free speech and free expression since it was created, over five years ago. People felt free to speak their mind and not feel that they are doing anything wrong. Since then, the government has tried to censor this forum, taking away our liberties, and allowing only material on the net that is suitable for all people. Congress feels that the Internet has too much material that can be hazardous to the citizens of this country. "William Olds, executive director of the Connecticut Civil Liberties Union, said that the essence of the Internet is its unrestrained flow of ideas, bordering on the anarchic, and that infringement of that begins a trip down a slope to giving the government power to pick what is good speech and what is bad speech"(Rabinovitz B4).

Censorship of the Internet is a violation of our liberties, and the government should not take away that freedom. Instead, the users should be able to choose what they do and don't want to see. By censoring the Net in this country, people in other countries that do not would also be affected.

The Communications Decency Act, or CDA, was government's first real attempt to censor the Internet. "Signed into law by President Clinton on Feb. 8, [1996] after being passed by an admittedly Net-illiterate Congress, the CDA was supposed to squelch online pornography and make the Net safe for children by banning 'indecent' content"(Quittner 56). Congress felt if the penalty was great enough, all the pornography and other obscene material would be deleted from the Net. "Violators [of the CDA] were subject to a maximum $250,000 fine or a two-year prison sentence"(Simons 57). But the government was so vague about the wording of the bill, there was no way it would work.

"The CDA made it a crime to post 'indecent' or 'patently offensive' material on the Net, where minors might happen upon it. The statue was also intended to stifle pornography on the Net, but its vague language made it illegal, for instance, to hold frank discussions on sexually transmitted diseases or breast cancer"(Simons 57). Many of the people who are for censorship of the Internet would never think that everything would be censored. Who is to say what is just pornography and what is indecent. Most people do not want Congress to be the one to make that decision.

William Olds also had said that "...the original law's language is troubling, and applying to cyberspace just compounds the problems. He said: 'The words 'annoy' and 'alarm' suffer from vagueness. What is alarming to one person may not be alarming to another'"(Rabinovitz B4). The wording in the CDA is so indefinite that it really could make everything on the Internet illegal.

The CDA's wording could even affect public libraries if enforced. If it were law, "...there is concern that libraries could face criminal sanctions for making their collections available online, and that the reporting of news stories could at some future time be chilled as newspapers and magazines increasingly offer online versions"("Censorship" A20). If the wording is so poor that public libraries can be fined, there is definitely something wrong.

The CDA also makes threats on the Internet illegal. "Under the law, threatening someone by computer would be a misdemeanor punishable by up to three months in prison and a fine of up to $500. For someone who had previously been convicted of a felony, such a threat would be a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $5,000"(Rabinovitz B4). Though stopping threats on the Internet is something most people agree with, the censoring did not seem legitimate. And catching someone in the act is much harder in the virtual world. Police can not bug the phones or stake out the house of the victim.

Though Congress itself was in favor of the bill, not all people in Congress felt it was legal. "After the so called Exon Amendment[(the Communications Decency Act)] was approved, Mr. Gingrich labeled it ill-advised and too sweeping, calling it 'a violation of the right of adults to communicate with each other'"(Lohr D4). The Justice Department also felt the CDA was not reasonable. "Critics of the Senate proposal said that by including 'indecent communication,' the provision would cover profanity and would apparently require on-line service companies... to screen their networks.... The Justice Department said such a law might be unconstitutional and difficult to enforce"(Lohr D4). The whole CDA idea shows how truly uneducated Congress is when it comes to the Internet. There are many groups that agree with Newt Gingrich and the Justice Department.

In order to use the net more effectively, the following organizations have joined forces on a single Congressional net campaign to stop the Communication Decency Act, S.314 & H.R. 1004 (in alphabetical order): (Note that the EEF-Austin is not a chapter of the DC-based EFF)

At the time the government felt the CDA was the only way to control the Internet. But, many felt that the Congress was so unclear in the wording of the CDA, it violated the First Amendment of the Constitution. "It held no hearings and made no effort to learn how the Internet actually works. Had it done so, it would have discovered that the Communications Decency Act was an unconstitutional and wholly unnecessary infringement on free speech"("Censorship" A20). "The Association of American Publishers called the CDA 'the cyberspace equivalent of book burning'"(Reid 16). Congress seems to do this a lot. Instead of finding a reasonable way to get things done, it thinks out a fast way to fix the problem and uses that.

When the CDA was passed, people tried everything to make sure it would not be able to operate.

The American Civil Liberties Union wasted no time, immediately filing suit in Philadelphia after President Clinton signed the bill into law. The ACLU suit, filed with 20 co plaintiffs, calls the CDA provisions "unconstitutionally vague and over broad." It notes that terms like "patently offensive" and "indecent" have never been clearly defined and are likely to result in a "chilling effect." (Reid 16)


The three judge panel.

With the ACLU's suit, the government decided not to start enforcing the law until after the case was over. Congress never expected that a law suit would immediately follow the passing of the bill. This may not have happened if the CDA was written clearly in the first place. "A panel of three federal judges, specially convened in Philadelphia to review the new law, pronounced the government's attempt to regulate online content more closely than print or broadcast media 'unconstitutional on its face' and 'profoundly repugnant'"(Quittner 56). The bill was declared unconstitutional in court, but an appeal has been issued. The panel discovered that:

...the law was so broadly worded that it could potentially prevent the dissemination of information about everything from the film "Leaving Las Vegas" to the controversy over female genital mutilation. "The government has made no showing that it has a compelling interest in preventing a seven-teen-year-old minor from accessing such images," the judges wrote. ("Free" A14)

As John Simons noted, the judges were Judge Stewart Dalzell, Judge Ronald Buckwalter and Judge Dolores Sloviter(57).

The CDA was trying to stop pornography on the Internet, but the fact is there is very little porn on the Net. "The issue of porn on the Net is bogus from first to last. I have been active online for more than a decade and the amount of bandwidth dedicated to pornography of any type is so slight as to make any effort to muzzle it questionable"(Higgins A25). Not only is the pornography on the Internet slight, it is very hard to just come upon. A user must deliberately try to find it. "It is hard to get sexually explicit materials. It is possible. But it is easy to avoid. There are a million things to do online. No one forces you to seek out sexually explicit materials"(Higgins A25). This whole pornography panic has happened before. "It's the Internet morality play of the 1990s. Or the Playboy magazine scare of the 1950s. Or the steamy celluloid reels of the 1920s. Or the erotic pages coming off the Gutenberg presses of the 1350s. No matter, it's the same fear, paranoia, and alarm we experience every time pornography meets a broad new medium"(Smith 44). The scare about pornography will pass, as it has before. In the United States, pornography is not really considered an important medium. "...the mainstream movie business dwarfs the porno racket, which is largely relegated to the back room - And only a small percentage of magazines, books, and comic books are dirty enough to be objectionable to most Americans"(Smith 44). Kids have always found away to get pornography. Stopping it in one medium will not stop them from getting offensive material from song lyrics, magazines, and movies.

As Fonda Lloyd notes, Andrew Kantor, senior editor of Internet World says that only 1% of the Internet is made up of pornography(39). Pornography has always been around, and probably will always be around. But since the percentage of accessible pornography on the net is so slight, it is really not as big a problem as Congress says.

For the small percent of pornography that is on the net, the laws that affect magazines and movies also hold true. "There are, of course, many effective laws already on the books for punishing people who make and distribute child pornography in any medium. Others, however, apparently see this shift to a new medium as an opportunity to banish words and images that, although legal, are to them offensive or annoying"(Lewis B14). It is government's job to enforce the laws that are in effect, instead of trying to obliterate pornography from the face of the earth. "Communities are still free to enforce their standards by restricting blue movie theaters; likewise the government can still enforce child pornography laws and other appropriate statutes on the Internet"("Free" A14). If the government were to enforce the present laws more, there would be no need for censoring the Internet.

Obscenity, along with child pornography, is illegal in the United States. "While there are people who sell obscene images online, as they do off-line, that is already illegal. Obscenity is not protected by the First Amendment"(Higgins A25). Obscenity may be thought of as another word as vague as "patently offensive" or "indecent," so there is a definition to what is and what is not obscene. "As spelled out by previous Supreme Court rulings, those laws use a three-pronged standard to test for obscenity: Does the material depict sexual conduct in a patently offensive way? Does it lack artistic merit? And does it violate community standards"(Quittner 57)?

The Internet does not require censoring. While Congress thought the Internet was worse than any other media when it came to pornography, this is far from the truth. "[The Judges]... learned that while on radio and television children can stumble across inappropriately explicit material simply by turning the set on, computer users must actively seek out the material they want to view"("Censorship" A20). The people who own the pages on the Net are very careful in only letting adults in. "The judges found that dicey material... was generally preceded by warnings admonishing those under the age of 18 to keep out. Even the government's own expert witness acknowledged that the odds were slim that a user would come across a sexually explicit site by accident"(Quittner 57). Most companies require some kind of membership, not allowing others in without giving personal information, including credit card information. This stops many kids from accessing these areas.

There is almost no chance of a person just stumbling upon pornography. The Uniform Resource Locator (URL) http://www.playboy.com is not something users can just type in without knowing where they are going. But that is besides the point. "'There is no evidence that sexually oriented material is the primary type of content on this new medium,' they [(the judges)] wrote. 'Communities over the Internet do not 'invade' an individual's home or appear on one's computer screen unbidden'"(Quittner 57). It is near impossible to get to a pornographic page on the web without warning prior to its appearing on the screen. And for parents, there are software packages to stop these pages from loading.

"In a striking 175-page memorandum that was published online within minutes of being handed down, the judges declared the Internet a medium of historic importance, a profoundly democratic channel for communication that should be nurtured, not stiffed"(Quittner 56). It is true, the judges learned a lot about the Internet before making their final decision. "'As the most participatory form of mass speech yet developed,' wrote Judge Stewart Dalzell in an eloquently crafted opinion, 'the Internet deserves the highest protection from government intrusion'"(Quittner 56). For now, the CDA is considered unconstitutional, but that will not stop Congress from taking the case to the Supreme Court.

Congress had felt that censoring the Internet would be as easy as any other medium.

But cyberspace doesn't work like broadcast, where a few licensed stations beam out to thousands or millions of viewers who have no idea what's coming up next. Various parts of cyberspace resemble postal mail, coffee klatches, public lectures, academic seminars, locker-room banter and print periodicals - not broadcast. (Levy 53)

As much as people think that the Internet is used to send bad things to other people who don't want it, this is not the case. "The medium is used for every purpose - delivering news, religious evangelism, academic research, business and just plain fun"(Sirico 48). Where else can a letter be sent from an office in America to a counterpart in Japan in an instant using Email. Where else can companies advertise world wide. Only on the Internet can advertisements be interactive with customers.

Even if the government were able to make the CDA legal, it would be impossible to censor such a large web of information. "The Internet is a truly international medium with no central company, country, or standard body exercising anything more than symbolic authority. Hence, it's fairly uncensorable"(Smith 44). Since the Internet is international, censoring it may take away the rights of other people not in this country. It can not be expected that France, for example, will obey an American law. "Ted Brown, chair of the department of Computer Science at Queens College, said he thinks the law was impractical anyway. 'The Internet is connected internationally,' he said. 'You can't police the whole world'"(Freifeld A59). Doing that would be wasting valuable time and money.

With so many people fighting against censorship, I do not think it would last, and if it did last, not very long. According to Michael Higgins, a journalist for Newsday, "...there is no way to prevent the transfer of pornography - or any information, legal or otherwise - now that worldclass encryption programs are available throughout the Internet"(A25). People will do anything they can to have freedom. The world wide size of the Internet is almost immeasurable. It would be impossible to keep track of everything in the world.

"It's a foolish decision in that it's not implementable," said Nicholas Negroponte, director of the Media Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and author of the book Being Digital. "I think governments are not understanding that the Internet cannot be controlled. It's unstoppable." (Benkelman A05)

Online services have tried to censor the Internet and have failed. "... America Online decided to censor the word 'breast' from its system... even in support group discussions between women with breast cancer" (Lewis B14). After many petitions, it was not long before "breast" was back on AOL. Using key words to censor out pages does not always work. CompuServe was another to try to censor.

Other civil libertarians said that by deleting the news simply by using key words like "sex," the censors deleted groups on subjects ranging from the serious, such as support groups for disabled people (alt.support.disabled.sexuality), to the absurd, such as a group for fans of Patrick Stewart's portrayal of Capt. Jean-Luc Picard in "Star Trek: The Next Generation" (alt.sexy.bald.captains). (Benkelman A05)

Many people are happy that the CDA did not pull through. "We are extremely pleased," said Gary E. Strong, director of the Queens Borough Public Library, which is rolling out Internet access at all 62 of its branches. "It ensures that customers of the Queens Library will have full access to the Internet without someone watching over their shoulders" (Freifeld A59). Our freedom is not in the clear yet. If and when the CDA case is taken to the Supreme Court, it will be up to those Judges to decide. The real question is, do they know anything about the Internet, or are they as illiterate as Congress?

With all the people who are pleased with free speech reigning, why did the government want to censor the Internet in the first place?

Senator Leahy attributes the overkill to a Congress bent on acting without regard to consequences. "None of us want children to be delving into pornography, but let's not deal with it in a way that cripples one of the best communications successes in decades," he says. "I'm not going to close down a beautiful city park because periodically some idiot comes to the corner and shouts obscenities." (Levy 53)

The Internet is a beautiful place. It should not have to be vandalized by Congress by taking out everything not suitable for a six year old.

But still, there are some places on the Internet that children should not be. "'We're talking about material going into the hands of young people whose lives can be permanently altered, 'says Mike Russell, spokesman for the Christian Coalition, which campaigned hard to get Congress to do something about it"(Quittner 56). There are things that can't be nationally controlled.

"The Internet is a wonderful education tool; it can put the equivalent of the Library of Congress on a student's desktop," said Peter Nickerson, developers of Seattle-based BESS Internet Filtering Services, in a statement released after the CDA ruling. "But it can also put a library of Playboys and books like The Terrorist's Handbook there too." (Aguilar 2)

There are things on the Internet that should not be there. It is obvious that there is a big difference between what is pornography and what is simply obscene and crude. It is startling that there are obscene materials on the Internet, but what is the most startling is that the government is not trying to stop the obscenity that is on the Internet, instead of censoring the entire Internet. The laws do exist to stop obscene material, but they are not enforced on the Internet. It is safe to say the material considered obscene is not at all socially acceptable. This includes child pornography, obscure sexual conduct, and other unacceptable behavior. If the existing laws were enforced, instead of censoring the Web in its entirety, the CDA would not be needed.

There are solutions to the problem of keeping the net censored sometimes. "'We need some sort of management to censor porn,' Johnson asserts, suggesting that it should be a joint effort that includes parents, government and online service companies." Duane G. Johnson is the president of ACTOM (Aiming Christians Toward Our Mission Inc.)(Lloyd 39). By making the government enforce the laws that already exist and have the parents watch their kids, we would not need censorship. "The most effective protection is to spend time with the child, sharing ideas and imparting values that the child can use to make decisions when, eventually, he or she grows up and enters the world"(Lewis B14). The Net is a valuable tool, giving culture, history, and fun to people of all ages and should not be banned from anyone.

It is very understandable that parents can't be over their children's shoulders all the time.

The market has already provided solutions. Internet users can subscribe to growing numbers of "parental control" programs. These filter out offensive materials by screening key words or simply limiting kids to a "white list" of approved sites. It's as easy as downloading a file and nearly impossible to outwit. (Sirico 48)

The software that is available is also amazing at keeping a watch over children on the Net. "Existing software programs, such as Net Nanny, Cybersitter and Surfwatch, already enable people to block undesirable material on their own computers. These packages work by not allowing files that contain key words, like sex, to be opened"(Lloyd 39). These programs can be downloaded directly from the Internet. They are fairly inexpensive and definitely worth it.

There is also a new way to control what is seen on the Net. "The Platform for Internet Content Selection (PICS) promises to create a sort of do-it-yourself censorship that will allow everybody both freedom to speak and freedom not to listen"(Browning 38). The PICS rating system is in the making right now. "PICS is being developed by the World Wide Web Consortium, a group based at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Led by Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee, PICS resolves the moral contradiction that lies at the heart of existing schemes to regulate the Net"(Browning 38). The PICS ratings are a lot like the rating system presently being used on television.

The rating system that PICS is using is very open. "Instead of creating a single rating system that applies the same set of values to all Web content, PICS encourages the creation of a variety of rating systems. Web sites can either rate themselves, or they can ask to be rated by a (supposedly objective) agency"(Browning 38). The PICS dream is getting closer and closer to reality. Self censoring will be easier than ever. "Both Netscape and Microsoft have promised to build PICS capabilities into forthcoming browsers. CompuServe has said it will put PICS ratings on all its content as it moves onto the Web"(Browning 38). All that will have to be done is tell the browser what to allow and it will do all the work.

With all that is out on the market to self censor, the CDA is still lurking around. The Blue Ribbon Campaign is the nets way to say, "I'm for free speech." "The EFF began the blue-ribbon campaign in February to protest the recently enacted 1996 Telecommunications law intended to limit 'indecent' content online"(Miller 41). Even after the CDA was considered unconstitutional, these ribbons are on pages everywhere, and not just English ones either. "'It means you're for constitutionally protected free speech being no more restricted online than in any other medium,' says Stanton McCandlish of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a group dedicated to promoting free speech on the Net'"(Miller 41).

Information on our freedom of speech on the Internet is readily available almost everywhere. "On the Web, information on the bill, the lawsuit, protests and alternatives to the CDA can be found at: The Electronic Frontier Foundation (http://www.eff.org/)"(Reid 16). The CDA case will most likely be going to the Supreme Court after an appeal is made. The war is not over yet.

Works Cited

Aguilar, Rose and Mike Yamamoto. "After CDA Ruling, Net Polices Itself." Http://www.news.com/SpecialFeatures/0,5,1574,00.html (21 Nov. 1996).

Benkelman, Susan. "Ban on Internet is Decried, Defied." Newsday 30 Dec. 1995: A05.

Browning, John. "The Internet is Learning to Censor Itself." Scientific American Sept. 1996: 38.

"Censorship in Cyberspace." New York Times 30 Apr. 1996: A20.

"Current List of Participating Organizations." Http://www.comedia.com/ftp/think/freedom/s314.vtw.txt (18 Nov. 1996).

Freifeld, Karen. "Parents Will Stay Wary." Newsday 13 June 1996: A59.

"Free Speech Flaps." The Wall Street Journal 24 June 1996: A14.

Hamilton, David P. "Asians Taste Free Speech on Internet." The Wall Street Journal 8 Dec. 1994: B1.

Higgins, Michael P. "New Communications Law is Indecent." Newsday 20 Feb. 1996: A25.

Levy, Steven. "Indecent Proposal: Censor the Net." Newsweek 3 April 1995: 53.

Lewis, Peter H. "Personal Computers; About Freedom of the Virtual Press." New York Times 2 Jan. 1996: B14.

Lloyd, Fonda Marie. "Is it Wise to Censor the Net?" Black Enterprise Dec. 1995: 39.

Lohr, Steve. "Conservatives Split on How to Regulate the Internet." New York Times 9 Nov. 1995: D4.

Miller, Samantha. "Blue Content, Blue Ribbons." People 22 Apr. 1996: 41.

Quittner, Joshua. "Free Speech for the Net." Time 24 June 1996: 56.

Rabinovitz, Johnathan. "Rules of Road on the Information Highway: Harassing by Computer a Crime." New York Times 13 June 1995: B4.

Reid, Calvin. "Outcry Over Telecom Anti-Smut Act. ACLU Files Free Speech Suit." Publishers Weekly 12 Feb. 1996: 16.

Simons, John. "Free Speech Breaks Loose in Cyberspace." U.S. News & World Report 24 June 1996: 57.

Sirico, Robert A. "Don't Censor the Internet." Forbes 29 July 1996: 48.

Smith, Gina. "Peeper Madness." Popular Science Jan. 1996: 44.

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