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COPA - Children's Online Protection Act deemed unconstitutional |
The Children's Online Protection Act (COPA) was deemed unconstitutional by the 3rd U.S. Appeals Court in Philadelphia.
Originally passed in 1998, the laws intent was to protect minors from pornography and adult content distributed over the Internet.
"...the Child Online Protection Act would effectively force all Web sites to provide only family-friendly content because it is not feasible to lock children out of sites that are lawful for adults" said John Morris, general counsel for the Center for Democracy & Technology.
The court stated:
“Material that’s harmful to minors” includes any communication that’s obscene or that: (A) the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find, taking the material as a whole and with respect to minors, is designed to appeal to, or is designed to pander to, the prurient interest; (B) depicts, describes, or represents, in a manner patently offensive with respect to minors, an actual or simulated sexual act or sexual contact, an actual or simulated normal or perverted sexual act, or a lewd exhibition of the genitals or post-pubescent female breast; and (C) taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors.
This is not to be confused with the COPPA (the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act), which applies to the online collection of personal information by persons or entities under U.S. jurisdiction from children under 13 years of age. It details what a website operator must include in a privacy policy, when and how to seek verifiable consent from a parent or guardian, and what responsibilities an operator has to protect children's privacy and safety online including restrictions on the marketing to those under 13.
You can find the opinion here. |
