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Federal Judge Blocks COPAA federal judge struck down March 22 the contentious Child Online Protection Act (COPA), which made it a crime for commercial websites to allow access to “harmful” material without first verifying user ages. In his ruling, Senior U.S. District Judge Lowell Reed Jr. stated that computer software filters serve to protect children from such controversial material—without violating free speech.“Perhaps we do the minors of this country harm if First Amendment protections, which they will with age inherit fully, are chipped away in the name of their protection,” wrote Reed, according to a March 22 Associated Press report. Lowell heard the challenge to the 1998 law, which was never enforced due to injunctions and lower court decisions, in October 2006. In the ACLU v. Gonzales lawsuit, plaintiffs including sexual health websites, the American Civil Liberties Union, Salon.com, and Nerve.com, argued that many legitimate sites could fall under COPA’s vague definitions. The Justice Department is expected to file an appeal. “It is not reasonable for the government to expect all parents to shoulder the burden to cut off every possible source of adult content for their children, rather than the government’s addressing the problem at its source,” government attorney Peter D. Keisler said in a post-trial brief. Posted on March 23, 2007. |
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