3.4 Offensive Content
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3.4 Offensive Content
As I mentioned earlier, pornography and other potentially offensive material comprise a noticeable proportion of web content. [8] Most national (and some local) governments have laws that address the selling or transportation of pornography. Could, you, as a cache operator, be liable because your cache stores or distributes such material? Only one thing is certain: there are no simple answers.
[8] Certainly not everyone finds pornography offensive. Use of the term here is only for convenience and is not meant to suggest that there is an obvious distinction between offensive and inoffensive material.
In 1996, the U.S. government passed the Communications Decency Act (CDA), which attempted to criminalize the sending of pornography and other obscene material over "telecommunications facilities." Furthermore, it sought to make liable anyone who:
knowingly permits any telecommunications facility under [his] control to be used for any activity prohibited [above] with the intent that it be used for such activity [9]
[9] 47 U.S.C. 223(d)(2).
This might not be as bad as it initially sounds, especially given the use of the words "knowingly" and "intent." Even better, the law also seems to provide an exemption for some providers:
No person shall be held [liable] solely for providing access or connection to or from a facility, system, or network not under that person's control, including transmission, downloading, intermediate storage, access software, or other related capabilities that are incidental to providing such access or connection that does not include the creation of the content of the communication. [10]
[10] 47 U.S.C. 223(e)(1).
This is good news for those of us who operate caches. The presence of the phrase "intermediate storage" is particularly comforting.
However, most of the provisions of the CDA were struck down as unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1997. The CDA was strongly opposed by groups such as the Electronic Freedom Foundation and the American Civil Liberties Union because it violates some fundamental rights (such as freedom of speech) granted by the Bill of Rights.
Admittedly, the discussion here has been very U.S.-centric. Laws of other countries are not discussed here, except to note that the Internet is generally not subject to geopolitical boundaries. The application of local and national laws to a network that connects millions of computers throughout the world is likely to be problematic .
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