Online Protection Panel Urges Filter Research
A congressionally appointed panel examining how to protect children from pornography on the Internet on Friday balked at recommending that public schools and libraries install software to block the material, even as Congress moved closer to requiring just such a step.
Members of the Commission on Child Online Protection said existing technologies fall short in their ability to distinguish between proper and improper text and images, and raise concerns among advocates of free speech.
Instead, the 18-member panel urged that more research be conducted into software programs that block or filter questionable material. Chairman Donald Telage, an executive at Network Solutions Inc., of Herndon, Va., called on the computer and the adult entertainment industries to do a better job of regulating themselves.
“The adult industry is coming of age,” Telage said. “It’s a big business. It’s time for it, like all the other online industries, to take care of problems.”
The report comes as a spirited debate over children’s use of the Internet and other media rages in Washington. A joint House-Senate panel Friday approved language that would force public schools and libraries to install filtering programs in computers purchased with certain federal funds.
The measure, which has been tacked onto the Education Department spending bill, requires schools to block obscenity and child pornography on all computers, and to screen out material “harmful to minors.”
The American Civil Liberties Union and library associations, among others, have opposed the legislation on free-speech grounds. The White House also has expressed concern about the scope of the measure, arguing that local communities should be allowed to develop their own guidelines, said spokesman Elliot Diringer.
“We don’t feel we should be mandating any particular technology,” Diringer said.
Congress could vote on the bill Monday, according to a staffer for Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a proponent of Internet filtering.
The Internet commission’s report culminated months of research and public hearings. The group also declined to recommend a new Internet address suffix, “.xxx.”
