[LM_NET] Filtering Follies

[Nancy Willard <nwillard@CSRIU.ORG>]

This will be a long message. One of the things that has fascinated, and
concerned, me for a very long time has been the promotion of filtering as
THE tool to protect children online. The different interests folks have
played is really amazing. I took the time to jot this all down for a
presentation a while back. Today I received a copy of quite an amazing
email. I will post it at the bottom.

Filtering Follies
 

·      65% of US homes where children/teens use the Internet relying on
filtering software.

·      CIPA requires all schools and libraries to install filtering.

·      And in about a month the US Department of Justice will be going to
court to prove that filtering does not work.

·      And the ACLU will be seeking to prove that filtering does work.

What is going on?

* Early Internet, pornography was primarily disseminated through newsgroups.
Because Universities were the only ones connected to the Internet, they
became major purveyors of porn

* As the Internet became commercialized all new technologies have
immediately become mechanism for dissemination of porn ­ web, P2P, streaming
video, Š

* 1995. Time magazine raised public attention to concern of online porn. The
news report was based on bogus research, but the concerns were real.

* 1996. Congress enacted Computer Decency Act. CDA prohibited distribution
of obscene material to minors through the Internet.

* 1997. The Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling that CDA was
unconstitutional.

* 1997. Internet Online Summit Focus on Children was held ­ hosted by Vice
President Al Gore, including representatives of Internet industry, various
advocacy groups from across the spectrum, schools, and libraries. Resulted
in strong promotion of ³user empowerment tools² to help parents and others
shield children from inappropriate material.

* 1999. Congress enacted Childrenıs Online Protection Act. COPA required
commercial distributors of material harmful to minors to protect their sites
from access by minors. ACLU immediately challenged COPA arguing that
filtering is a less restrictive alternative.

* 2000. Congress enacted Childrenıs Internet Protection Act arguing that if
filtering is the solution, the places where youth are accessing the
Internet, schools and libraries, should use filtering. Strongly promoted by
conservative religious organizations and opposed by civil liberty groups.
ACLU and ALA challenged CIPA. But ACLU was in a bind because of its argument
in COPA. Evidence was presented on concerns of overblocking, but no evidence
presented on concerns of underblocking.

* 2003. Supreme Court held CIPA constitutional because filtering is an
effective solution and filters can be easily overridden to provide access to
inappropriately blocked material ­ but specifically noted that if filtering
was implemented in a way that it could not easily be overridden to provide
access, this could raise constitutional concerns ­ a point that the vast
majority of school districts are ignoring.

* 2003. US governmentıs Voice of America program provided funding to
Peacefire, a filtering proponent, to develop a free software program that
can easily be installed on PCs to circumvent any filtering ­ resulting in
creation of Circumventor. Thus an easy to use tool to bypass filters was
created -- with US government funds.  (For those of you who live in other
countries, now is the time to ROFL.)

* 2004. Supreme Court issued a ruling on COPA. The Court ruled that the law
was probably unconstitutional because filtering is a superior and less
restrictive alternative, but sent case back to trial level since there had
been so many changes in laws and technologies since the first trial.

* 2006. A new study by the Crimes Against Children Research Center found a
pronounced increase in Internet users ages 10 to 17 who were exposed to
unwanted sexual material ‹ this despite a significant increase in use of
filtering software by parents.

* 2006. A new COPA trial will be held ‹ currently scheduled for October. To
prevail, DOJ must prove that filtering does not work. The ACLU must prove
that filtering does work.
 
In Sum:
 
US Government

* Congress enacted COPA requiring age verification ­ but COPA clearly will
not prevent dissemination of porn because Internet is international and porn
purveyors will simply move their operations off-shore. Federal ban on online
gambling does not work either.

* Enacted CIPA requiring schools and libraries to spend billions of dollars
to install filtering to protect children.

* DOJ defended CIPA, argued that filtering works and is necessary.

* DOJ is now defending COPA, will argue that filtering does not work.

* USıs Voice of America funded development of software that makes it easy to
circumvent any filter.

 
ACLU (and other civil liberties groups)

* Promoted filtering at the Online Internet Summit.

* Challenged CIPA, arguing that filtering does not work because filters
overblock. Lost the CIPA case because they presented NO evidence about the
fallibility of filtering and focused solely on the ability of adult library
patrons to access adult material. They also did not present any evidence of
the relationship between filtering companies and the religious right,
leading the the conclusion that blocking is biased ‹ a relationship that was
obvious to anyone who looked closely.

* Is still challenging COPA, arguing that filtering works and is a less
restrictive alternative.

* Have been unwilling to take on any case challenging the relationship
between filtering companies and the religious right or the inadequate manner
in which schools have implemented filtering because COPA is still being
litigated. 
 
Internet Industry

* Promote filtering as a reasonably effective solution because want parents
to allow children to spend lots of unsupervised time on the Internet.

* Advertise ³safe online environments² to parents at same time they are
promoting massive advertising for kid-related products to children within
these so-called "safe" environments.

* Some companies may concerned about off-shore migration of porn purveyors
due to anticipated loss of revenue.

* Filtering companies are probably concerned that DOJıs case will damage
their market. 

 
Conservative Organizations and Filtering Companies

* Conservative organizations strongly promote filtering.

* Some filtering companies are be ³in bed² with conservative organizations,
including companies whose products are used in public schools

* Many filtering products block ³liberal-perspective² sites that provide
information on gender orientation, safe sex, abortion/morning-after, and
non-traditional religions, but do not block ³conservative-perspective² sites
on same subjects. Use of products that block in this manner is clearly
unconstitutional. 

Parents

* Significant overreliance on filtering.

* Are not supervising childrenıs Internet use effectively, probably because
of false security due to reliance on filtering.

Schools

* Significant concerns about current practices in Internet use management,
especially in the context of social networking.

* Have not selected blocking categories properly -- many schools are
ignoring the unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination. This is especially
evident in decisions to block access to sites containing information about
homosexuality and non-traditional religions.

* Many have not implemented the ability to promptly override the filter to
provide access to students. This is unconstitutional -- see the CIPA
decision. ALL librarians and computer lab teachers should have the authority
and ability to immediately override the filter, review a site, and provide
immediate access to students. Educators are information professionals -- the
low level staff at the filtering companies who are making blocking decisions
are not. 

The Truth About Filters

* Filters can provide some protection against access to sites deemed
unacceptable. 

* Filters have significant failure rate in blocking access to harmful
materials.

* Filters frequently overblock and prevent access to appropriate materials,
sometimes inadvertently and sometimes apparently based on inappropriate,
conservative bias.

* Filtering companies frequently establish categories where they block
access to sites containing material that should be appropriate for youth
along with material that would not be considered appropriate.

* Filters can easily be circumvented by using proxies or innovative access
techniques.

* Reliance on filtering has led to perception that filtering can address all
Internet use concerns and a failure to focus on human factors, especially
standards for use and effective monitoring and supervision.

Children and Teens

* No one is really doing a good job protecting younger children and helping
teens learn necessary steps to avoid unwanted exposure to pornography.


Now here is an interesting new tidbit. From a message sent around September
5, 2006 with a request that it be disseminated to librarians:

³I am one of the lawyers representing plaintiffs in the federal challenge
to the criminal part of COPA (crime to engage in speech that is harmful
to minors).  I am looking for a school person (librarian or technology
person) that uses filters and is happy with the amount of protection
they provide to students/children (we argue that voluntary use of
filters is a less restrictive alternative to the criminal statute).²

Interested people can contact Chris directly at: chansen@aclu.org ...

Yes, she says in advance of the inevitable requests, you may send this
message further. 

Nancy

Who testified before the COPA Commission and read to them from Dr. Spock, Oh
the Places Youıll Go:

Youıll look up and down streets. Look Œem over with care. About some you
will say, ³I donıt choose to go there.² With your head full of brains and
shoes full of feet, youıre too smart to go down any not-so-good streets.

-- 
Nancy Willard, M.S., J.D.
Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use
http://csriu.org
http://cyberbully.org
nwillard@csriu.org

Cyberbullying and Cyberthreats: Responding to the Challenge of Online Social
Cruelty, Threats, and Distress, a resource for educators, is now available
online at http://cyberbully.org.

Cyber-Safe Kids, Cyber-Savvy Teens: Helping Young People Use the Internet
Safety and Responsibly. Jossey-Bass (forthcoming)



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