Online Child Safety, Privacy and Free Speech: An Overview of Challenges in Congress & the States

Abstract

This paper is an edited transcript of PFF Congressional Seminar that took place on July 27, 2009 in Washington, DC.Online child safety, privacy, and free speech remain hotly debated issues at both the federal and state levels. How serious are these concerns? Is legislation or regulation needed to address them? What free speech issues are at stake? Should Congress take the lead or leave it to the States to experiment with different models? These and other issues were discussed at a Congressional seminar hosted by The Progress & Freedom Foundation. PFF Senior Fellow Adam Thierer began the discussion by describing current online safety issues and outlined regulatory, privacy and free speech issues surrounding government responses and proposed solutions to the problem.Parry Aftab, Executive Director of WiredSafety.org, discussed federal legislation that has been proposed to address cyberbullying, including making such behavior a felony.Todd Haiken, Senior Manager of Policy at Common Sense Media, outlined what he viewed as the biggest change in proposed solutions to online safety concerns: the shift away from a focus on crime and risk prevention to an education and empowerment model. Jim Halpert, Partner at DLA Piper, questioned the effectiveness of proposed regulation. Berin Szoka, Senior Fellow at The Progress & Freedom Foundation, voiced concern over the costs to websites if mandatory screening or filtering of users was implemented. He explained that 'if every website, every blog around the world that integrates social networking has to take on responsibility for doing that kind of screening or filtering or segregation of users, the effect on the media landscape and Internet culture would be enormous.'