"Battle ensues over 1998 anti-porn law targeting Internet"

[Damian_Maxcash]

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_4539917?source=rss

Eight years after Congress tried to criminalize material deemed ''harmful to children,'' free speech advocates and Web site publishers took their challenge of the law to trial Monday.
Salon.com, Nerve.com and other plaintiffs backed by the American Civil Liberties Union are suing over the 1998 Child Online Protection Act. They believe the law could restrict legitimate material they publish online - exposing them to fines or even jail time.
The Justice Department argues that it is easier to stop online pornography at the source than to keep children from viewing it.
The law, signed by then-President Clinton, requires adults to use some sort of access code, or perhaps a credit card number, to view material that may be considered ''harmful to children.'' It would impose a $50,000 fine and six-month prison term on commercial Web site operators that publish such content, which is to be defined by ''contemporary community standards.''
It has yet to be enforced, however.
The U.S. Supreme Court has twice granted preliminary injunctions, including one in June 2004 in which it ruled 5-4 that the plaintiffs were likely to prevail.
The ACLU argues that filters are a more effective way of policing the Internet. It notes that the law would not regulate any material posted overseas.

Its all interesting - but I highlighted the bit that got my attention.....

[squishypimp]

is this for real?

[Damian_Maxcash]

Originally Posted by squishypimp

is this for real?

Yeah - the law has been around for ages - but never enforced.

So I'm not sure why these guys are suing the Government over it.....

Its the credit card verification bit that got me - think about what happened to the AVS's

[Dirty Dane]

So, adults without cc would be prevented from watching porn. Thats not gonna work in a free world.

[Damian_Maxcash]

I give up......

[Rochard]

Our government is overly concerned about children viewing any type of sexual adult material. However, at 6pm tonight while I was eating dinner CNN is playing footage over and over again of US Marines killing Iraqis.

What message does this send to our youth? That it's bad to have sex but it's okay to kill people? Seems to me our youth is doing both.

Our goverment makes these laws in order to say "Yes, we are dong something about porn" yet never act on these laws.

And at the same time the people creating the laws - Foley - Seem to be the people violating them.

[Dagwolf]

Originally Posted by damian2001

Yeah - the law has been around for ages - but never enforced.

So I'm not sure why these guys are suing the Government over it.....

Its the credit card verification bit that got me - think about what happened to the AVS's

They still exist... It was Visa that made them change tactics.

... but that's interesting.

[kane]

Originally Posted by damian2001

Yeah - the law has been around for ages - but never enforced.

So I'm not sure why these guys are suing the Government over it.....

Its the credit card verification bit that got me - think about what happened to the AVS's

It's actually not the people fighting it that is bringing it back up it is the government. This law was pass a long time ago and twice the supreme court has upheld the injuction that stops it from being enforced. The government is now heading back into court to fight that and try to get the injunctions lifted so they can enforce it.

I doubt they will win, that law had so many flaws in it that so far every judge that has seen it says it goes to far, but they will keep trying. I think they are hoping it ends up before the now more conservative supreme court.