COPA Commission Issues Report to Congress

(October 23, 2000) The COPA Commission, which was charged by Congress with making recommendations for protecting children from online porn, released its report to Congress at an event on Capitol Hill. It recommended that the "online commercial adult industry should voluntarily take steps to restrict minors' ready access to adult content."

The Child Online Protection Act (COPA), which was passed in late 1998, created the COPA Commission to study methods to help reduce access by minors to certain sexually explicit material, defined in the statute as harmful to minors.

The Commission recommended that "a combination of public education, consumer empowerment technologies and methods, increased enforcement of existing laws, and industry action are needed to address this concern."

Many, but not all, members of the Commission gathered in the Capitol Building on Friday morning, October 20, to release and comment upon their report. Several members proceeded to argue regarding what the report recommended, as well as the underlying merits various methods for dealing with online porn.

Commission Chairman Donald Telage, who is Executive Advisor for Global Internet Strategy at Network Solutions, spoke first. He stated that "no single technology or method will completely protect children," and outlined the recommendations of the Commission. (See, box at right.) He added, "this discussion is clearly not over."

As soon as he finished, others rushed to speak. Commissioner Robert Flores, who is Senior Counsel for the National Law Center for Children and Families, stated that the Commission "took a hard look" at filtering technology, and "we found it to be a very effective technology." He continued that "what we did not address was the issue of mandatory imposition."

Flores was an attorney in the Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section of the Department of Justice, Criminal Division, in the Bush administration.

Then, Alan Davidson, of the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), who is not a member of the Commission, stated that "they are imperfect" and "there were concerns with the use of filters". He argued that decisions regarding whether or not to use filtering technology are "best left to local communities and families."

Davidson, Flores, and others went back and forth as to what the report recommended. Flores stated that the report is silent on whether Congress should mandate filtering by schools and libraries which receives e-rate subsidies. He wrote in a separate statement that "Congress did not ask the Commission to recommend new legislation or comment on the COPA's constitutionality. The fact that the Commission did neither should not be construed as anything except our adherence to our Congressional mandate."

Jerry Berman, head of the CDT, and a member of the Commission, wrote a separate statement in which he argued that "the Commission concludes that new laws would not only be Constitutionally dubious, they would not effectively limit children's access to inappropriate materials. The Commission instead finds that empowering families to guide their children's Internet use is the only feasible way to protect children online while preserving First Amendment values."

Bill Parker, or Crosswalk.com, a Christian web site, stated that the report is "a first step, but a step we have got to take."

Parker added in his written statement that "The fact that the Commission is not recommending new substantive means to protect children should not be assumed to indicate that new substantive measures should not be taken. The work of the Commission to date has been merely to point out the obvious measures for which there is broad consensus and that should be taken immediately. The Congress should immediately initiate another commission, or reconvene this one, to pursue these possibilities."

Several members pointed out that the Commission had little time, and no funding, to conduct its study. Several recommended that the matter be studied further.

There was also discussion of further law enforcement efforts. The report recommended more funding for prosecution of illegal obscenity and child pornography.

Mike Horowitz, of the Clinton Justice Department, was present. His Department already has both statutory authority, and funding, for prosecuting both obscenity and child pornography. However, it prosecutes only child pornography. This has led to some angry exchanges at oversight hearing of the House Telecom Subcommittee.

Horowitz spoke of the problem of retaining qualified attorneys at the Department of Justice. However, he did not address his Department's refusal to prosecute online obscenity in the past, or state that it would follow the Commission's recommendation in the future.

Other members of the Commission who participated in the event included George Vradenburg of AOL, Stephen Balkam of the Internet Content Rating Association, and Donna Rice Hughes.