|
The Communications Decency Act (CDA) was arguably the first attempt by the United States Congress to regulate pornographic material on the Internet, in response to public concerns in 1996. In 1997, the U.S. Supreme Court partially overturned the law in one of its landmark rulings regarding the Internet. Type Bicameral Houses Senate House of Representatives President of the Senate Dick Cheney, R, since January 20, 2001 Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, R, since January 6, 1999 Members 535 plus 4 Delegates and 1 Resident Commissioner Political groups (as of January 4, 2005 elections) Democratic Party Republican Party...
The Supreme Court Building, Washington, D.C. The Supreme Court Building, Washington, D.C., (large image) The Supreme Court of the United States, located in Washington, D.C., is the highest court (see supreme court) in the United States; that is, it has ultimate judicial authority within the United States...
The Act was Title V of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. It was introduced to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation by senators James Exon (D-NE) and Slade Gorton (R-WA) in 1995. The amendment that became the CDA was added to the Telecommunications Act in the Senate by an 84-16 vote on June 14, 1995. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 was the first major overhaul of United States telecommunications policy in nearly 62 years, modifying earlier legislation, primarily the Communications Act of 1934. ...
The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation is a standing committee of the United States Senate in charge of all senate matters related to the following subjects: Coast Guard Coastal zone management Communications Highway safety Inland waterways, except construction Interstate commerce Marine and ocean navigation, safety, and transportation Marine...
Jim Exon John James Jim Exon (August 9, 1921 – June 10, 2005) was an American Democratic politician. ...
Slade Gorton Thomas Slade Gorton III (born January 8, 1928) is an American politician. ...
As eventually passed by Congress, Title V affected the Internet (and online communications) in two significant ways. First, it attempted to regulate both indecency (when available to children) and obscenity in cyberspace. Second, Section 230 of the Act, authored by Representatives Christopher Cox (R-CA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR), declared that operators of Internet services were not to be construed as publishers (and thus legally liable for the words of third parties who use their services). A dictionary definition of Indecent not conforming with accepted standards of behaviour or morality. ...
The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view. ...
The House of Representatives is the larger of two houses that make up the U.S. Congress, the other being the United States Senate. ...
Charles Christopher Cox (born October 16, American politician, Republican member of the United States House of Representatives since 1989, representing the 48th District of California. ...
Ronald Lee Wyden (born May 3, 1949) to German American parents, is Oregons senior United States Senator. ...
Anti-indecency and -obscenity provisions
The most controversial portions of the Act were those relating to indecency on the Internet. The relevant sections of the Act were introduced in response to fears that Internet pornography was on the rise. Indecency in TV and radio broadcasting had already been regulated by the Federal Communications Commission—broadcasting of offensive speech was restricted to certain hours of the day, when minors were supposedly least likely to be exposed. Violators could be fined and potentially lose their licenses. The Internet, however, had only recently been opened to commercial interests by the 1992 amendment to the National Science Foundation Act and thus was not considered by many previous laws. The CDA, which affected the Internet and cable television, marked the first attempt to expand regulation to this new sphere. The FCCs official seal. ...
Coaxial cable is often used to transmit cable television into the house. ...
Passed by Congress on February 1, 1996, and signed by President Clinton on February 8, 1996, the CDA imposed criminal sanctions on anyone who A congress is a gathering of people, especially a gathering for a political purpose. ...
February 1 is the 32nd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ...
1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ...
Order: 42nd President Term of Office: January 20, 1993–January 20, 2001 Preceded by: George H. W. Bush Succeeded by: George W. Bush Date of birth: August 19, 1946 Place of birth: Hope, Arkansas Date of death: Place of death: First Lady: Hillary Rodham Clinton Political party: Democratic Vice...
February 8 is the 39th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ...
1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ...
- knowingly (A) uses an interactive computer service to send to a specific person or persons under 18 years of age, or (B) uses any interactive computer service to display in a manner available to a person under 18 years of age, any comment, request, suggestion, proposal, image, or other communication that, in context, depicts or describes, in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards, sexual or excretory activities or organs.
It further criminalized the transmission of materials that were "obscene or indecent" to persons known to be under 18.
Free speech advocates, however, worked diligently and successfully to overturn the portion relating to indecent, but not obscene, speech. They argued that speech protected under the First Amendment, such as printed novels or the use of the seven dirty words, would suddenly become unlawful when posted to the Internet. Critics also claimed the bill would have a chilling effect on the availability of medical information. Online civil liberties organizations arranged protests against the bill, for example the Black World Wide Web protest which encouraged webmasters to make the site backgrounds black for 48 hours after the passing, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation's Blue Ribbon Online Free Speech Campaign. Freedom of speech is the right to freely say what one pleases, as well as the related right to hear what others have stated. ...
The seven dirty words are seven English words comedian George Carlin listed in his monologue Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television, released in 1972 on his album Class Clown. ...
A chilling effect is a situation where speech or conduct is suppressed or limited by fear of penalization at the hands of an individual or group. ...
On February 1, 1996, a large number of web sites were turned black for 48 hours as a protest against the passing of the Communications Decency Act in the United States. ...
EFF Logo The EFF uses the blue ribbon as symbolism for their Free Speech defense. ...
Example Blue Ribbon graphic EFF encourages websites to use. ...
Legal Challenges In Philadelphia on June 12, 1996 a panel of federal judges blocked part of the CDA, saying it would infringe upon the free speech rights of adults. The next month, another US federal court in New York struck down the portion of the CDA intended to protect children from indecent speech as too broad. On June 26, 1997, the Supreme Court upheld the Philadelphia court's decision in Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union, stating that the indecency provisions were an unconstitutional abridgement of the First Amendment right to free speech because they did not permit parents to decide for themselves what material was acceptable for their children, extended to non-commercial speech, and did not define "patently offensive," a term with no prior legal meaning. (The New York case, Reno v. Shea, was affirmed by the Supreme Court the next day, without a published opinion.) Nickname: City of Brotherly Love, Philly, the Quaker City Motto: Philadelphia maneto (Let brotherly love continue) Location in Pennsylvania Coordinates: Country United States State Pennsylvania County Philadelphia Founded October 27, 1682 Incorporated October 25, 1701 Mayor John F. Street (D) Area - City 369. ...
June 12 is the 163rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (164th in leap years), with 202 days remaining. ...
1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ...
Freedom of speech is the right to freely say what one pleases, as well as the related right to hear what others have stated. ...
Nickname: Big Apple; City that never Sleeps; Gotham Location in the state of New York Coordinates: Country United States State New York Boroughs Bronx (The Bronx) New York (Manhattan) Queens (Queens) Kings (Brooklyn) Richmond (Staten Island) Mayor Michael Bloomberg (R) Area - City 1,214. ...
June 26 is the 177th day of the year (178th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 188 days remaining. ...
1997 (MCMXCVII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest judicial body in the United States and is the only part of the judicial branch of the United States federal government explicitly specified in the United States Constitution. ...
In Reno v. ...
The first ten Amendments to the U.S. Constitution make up the Bill of Rights. ...
This article is in need of attention. ...
In 2003, Congress amended the CDA to remove the indecency provisions struck down in Reno v. ACLU. A separate challenge to the provisions governing obscenity, known as Nitke v. Gonzales, was rejected by a federal court in New York in 2005. The Supreme Court summarily affirmed that decision in 2006. Barbara Nitke is an internationally known photographer who specializes in the subject of human sexual relations, especially in the BDSM community. ...
Congress has made two narrower attempts to regulate children's exposure to Internet indecency since the Supreme Court overturned the CDA. Court injunction blocked enforcement of the first, the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), almost immediately after its passage in 1998; the law was later overturned. While legal challenges also dogged COPA's successor, the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA) of 2000, the Supreme Court upheld it as constitutional in 2004. The Child Online Protection Act[1] (COPA)[2] is a law in the United States of America, passed in 1998 with the declared purpose of protecting children from harmful sexual material on the internet. ...
The Childrens Internet Protection Act, also known as CIPA, is one of a number of bills that the United States Congress has proposed in an attempt to limit childrens exposure to pornography and other controversial material online. ...
Section 230 -
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act was not part of the original Senate legislation, but was added in conference with the House, where it had been separately introduced by Representatives Chris Cox (R-CA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) as the Internet Freedom and Family Empowerment Act and passed by a near-unanimous vote on the floor. It added valuable protection for online service providers and users from action against them for the actions of others, stating in part that "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider". Effectively, this section immunizes ISPs and other service providers from torts committed by users over their systems. As a result of the John Seigenthaler Sr. Wikipedia biography controversy, and other incidents where individuals have been allegedly libeled by anonymous or judgment-proof parties, this section of the Act has come under fire, with numerous calls for revisions to the Act to restore service provider liability in some cases. Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 (a common name for Title V of the Telecommunications Act of 1996) is a landmark piece of Internet legislation in the United States. ...
Seal of the U.S. Senate The United States Senate is one of the two chambers of the United States Congress, the other being the House of Representatives. ...
Seal of the House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives (or simply the House) is one of the two chambers of the United States Congress, the other being the Senate. ...
The House of Representatives is the larger of two houses that make up the U.S. Congress, the other being the United States Senate. ...
Chris Cox For other people named Chris Cox, see Chris Cox (disambiguation). ...
Ronald Lee Wyden (born May 3, 1949) to German American parents, is Oregons senior United States Senator. ...
John Seigenthaler Sr. ...
Through the so-called Good Samaritan provision, this section also protects ISPs from liability for restricting access to certain material or giving others the technical means to restrict access to that material.
See also - OCILLA portion of the DMCA, which contingently protects online service providers from liability for copyright infringement
The Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act (OCILLA), a portion of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act known as DMCA 512 or the DMCA takedown provisions, is a 1998 US law that provided a safe harbor to online service providers (OSPs, including ISPs) that promptly take down content if someone alleges...
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a United States copyright law which criminalizes production and dissemination of technology that can circumvent measures taken to protect copyright, not merely infringement of copyright itself, and heightens the penalties for copyright infringement on the Internet. ...
External links |
Feeds |
Contact