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Computer underground Digest Wed Jun 19, 1996 Volume 8 : Issue 47
ISSN 1004-042X
Editor: Jim Thomas (cudigest@sun.soci.niu.edu)
News Editor: Gordon Meyer (gmeyer@sun.soci.niu.edu)
Archivist: Brendan Kehoe
Shadow Master: Stanton McCandlish
Field Agent Extraordinaire: David Smith
Shadow-Archivists: Dan Carosone / Paul Southworth
Ralph Sims / Jyrki Kuoppala
Ian Dickinson
Cu Digest Homepage: http://www.soci.niu.edu/~cudigest
CONTENTS, #8.47 (Wed, Jun 19, 1996)
File 1--Re: Virtual Magistrate Decision
File 2--(S 1237) Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1995
File 3--"The One that Got Away" Port (Brock Meeks)
File 4--Religious right and the Net
File 5--Cu Digest Header Info (unchanged since 7 Apr, 1996)
CuD ADMINISTRATIVE, EDITORIAL, AND SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION ApPEARS IN
THE CONCLUDING FILE AT THE END OF EACH ISSUE.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 13:32:58 -0700
From: Alan Lewine <alewine@dcez.com>
Subject: File 1--Re: Virtual Magistrate Decision
I attended the National Association for Automated Information
Research conference on Online Disp[ute Resolution at which the
Virtual Magistrate decision was announced. I have posted the Virtual
Magistrate decision in full text to Declan for posting to this list.
Here is a brief summary of the decision as I see it. (Incl. relevant
portions of the America Online Terms of Service (TOS) and Rules of
the Road (RoR) - part of the contract between AOL and its members.
full text of the decision is available at
http://vmag/law.vill.edu:8080/ .
AOL voluntarily participated in the first arbitration proceding on
the Internet through the Virtual Magistrate (VM), which involved a
challenge against a spammer, E_mail America, distributing junk mail
on the AOL network. Although the VM does not have any legal
enforcement power, the establishment of an Internet protocol
prohibiting spammingmay provide persuasive authority to cite in
future legal procedings. VM released its decision 21 May. The
decision along with the complaint and all associated materials are
available thru the VM web site. the decision involved three parties:
an actor - E-mail America (who never responded to invitations to
participate), a complainant - Jim Tierney, a former state Attorney
General and AOL subscriber, and a sysop - AOL. It took the form of
an "in rem" (involving a thing, rather than person(s)) proceding
against a screenname and an associated e-mail advertisement. Perhaps
a proceding against such cyberspacial entities would be better
termed "in meme" than "in rem."
Virtual Magistrate Decision
Paragraph 4(a) of the TOS addressing content may be read as
addressing content generally, whether or not it originates within
AOL. Therefore , because AOL is not a public forum or common
carrier, the determinatio n of what is offensive is within the
subjective purview of AOL. AOL may appropriately consider system
limitations internet custom and practice, and especially customer
complaints
While AOL does not pre-screen content, blocking of a repetitive
message that has been post-screened at least once would not violate
the no pre-screening promise in the TOS.
See also relevant passages in TOS and RoR: TOS 2.5: Prohibits
online conduct by members that inhibit other member use or enjoyment
TOS 4.2 AOL Inc. reserves the right to prohibit conduct . . . harmfu
l to individual members.
RoR 2.C. Online Conduct prohibited or discouraged includes
harassment, impersonation and especially, (viii) unsolicited
advertising.
Fromthe Rules of the Road and Terms of Service, contractual AOL
documents:
<< RULES OF THE ROAD
<<2.C. Online Conduct. Please refer to Section 2.5 of the Terms of
Service Agreement for AOL Inc. policy on impermissible types of online
conduct. Below are some common violations of the Terms of Service. This
list is not exhaustive. AOL Inc. reserves the right, but does not assume
the responsibility, to restrict communication which AOL Inc. deems in its
discretion to be harmful to individual Members, damaging to the
communities which make up the AOL Service, or in violation of AOL Inc.
or any third-party rights. Please be aware, however, that communication
over the AOL Service often occurs in real-time, or is posted on one of
the AOL Service thousands of message boards or libraries, and AOL Inc.
cannot, and does not intend to, screen communication in advance.
(i) Offensive Communication. The AOL Service is a
community-oriented service composed of many different communities of
people. Our goal is to provide an interesting, stimulating and fun place
for all Members. Using vulgar, abusive or hateful language undermines
this goal and is not allowed. Please use your best judgment and be
respectful of other Members. . . .
(ii) Harassment. When a Member targets another specifically to
cause him/her distress, embarrassment, unwanted attention, or other
discomfort, this is harassment. AOL Inc. does not condone harassment in
any form and may suspend or terminate the accounts of any Member who
harasses others. You may have a disagreement with someone's point of
view -- we encourage lively discussion in our chat rooms and message
boards -- but personal attacks, or attacks based on a person race,
national origin, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation or other
such affiliation, are prohibited. If you have a disagreement with
someone's point of view, address the subject, not the person.
(v) Impersonation. This can involve the portrayal of an account
in an official capacity, such as AOL Inc. staff or an information
provider, authorized Guide or Host, or communication under a false name
or a name that you are not authorized to use. Members must avoid the
portrayal of AOL personnel or others persons in all forms of online
communication, including, but not limited to, screen names, member
profiles, chat dialogue and message postings.
(viii) Advertising and Solicitation. You may not use the AOL
Service to send unsolicited advertising, promotional material, or other
forms of solicitation to other Members except in those specified areas
that are designated for such a purpose (e.g., the classified area).
<<RULES OF THE ROAD
<<D. Third-Party Content and Information.
Because AOL Inc. encourages open and candid communication, it
cannot determine in advance the accuracy of Content transmitted on the
AOL Service. AOL is not responsible for screening, policing, editing, or
monitoring such Content. If notified of allegedly infringing,
defamatory, damaging, illegal or offensive Content, AOL Inc. may
investigate the allegation and determine in good faith and in its sole
discretion whether to remove or request the removal of such Content from
the AOL Service. AOL Inc. shall be held harmless from any performance or
non-performance by AOL Inc. of such activities, as long as it has acted
in good faith.
<<RULES OF THE ROAD
<<4. Public and Private Communication
The AOL Service offers Members the capability to communicate in
Public Areas generally accessible to other Members or to communicate
privately with another Member. Public Areas are those features that are
generally accessible to other Members, such as, but not limited to, chat
rooms, online forums, and message boards. Private Communication is
electronic correspondence sent or received by you to particular
individuals. AOL Inc. will maintain the AOL Service Public Areas as an
open forum for discussion of a wide range of issues and expression of
diverse viewpoints. AOL Inc. will administer standards of online conduct
according to its TOS for the enjoyment of all its Members. While we will
endeavor to monitor the Public Areas to ensure that online standards are
being maintained, AOL Inc. has neither the practical capability, nor does
it intend, to act in the role of Big Brother by screening public
communication in advance.
It is AOL Inc. policy to respect the privacy of personal
electronic communication. AOL Inc. will not intentionally inspect the
contents of an electronic message (E-Mail or Instant Message) s
ent by
one Member to another individual, monitor discussions in private rooms,
or disclose the contents of any personal electronic communication to an
unauthorized third party, except as required or permitted to do so by
law. AOL Inc. reserves the right to cooperate fully with local, state,
or federal officials in any investigation relating to any Content,
including private electronic communication, transmitted on the AOL
Service or the unlawful activities of any Member.
AOL Inc. reserves the right to remove any Content that it deems
in its sole discretion to be a violation of its Terms of Service. AOL
Inc. may terminate immediately any Member who misuses or fails to abide
by its Terms of Service.
<<TERMS OF SERVICE
<<2.5 Online Conduct. Any conduct by a Member that in AOL Inc.
discretion restricts or inhibits any other Member from using or enjoying
the AOL Service will not be permitted. Member agrees to use the AOL
Service only for lawful purposes. Member is prohibited from posting on
or transmitting through the AOL Service any unlawful, harmful,
threatening, abusive, harassing, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, profane,
hateful, racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable material of any
kind, including, but not limited to, any material which encourages
conduct that would constitute a criminal offense, give rise to civil
liability or otherwise violate any applicable local, state, national or
international law.
<<4.2 AOL Inc. reserves the right to prohibit conduct, communication, or
Content which it deems in its discretion to be harmful to individual
Members, the communities which make up the AOL Service, AOL Inc. or
other third-party rights, or to violate any applicable law.
Notwithstanding the foregoing, neither AOL Inc. nor its Information
Providers have the practical ability to restrict conduct, communication
or Content which might violate its TOS prior to transmission on the AOL
Service, nor can they ensure prompt editing or removal of questionable
Content after on-line posting. Accordingly, neither AOL Inc. nor any
Information Provider shall assume liability for any action or inaction
with respect to conduct, communication or Content on the AOL Service.
<<4.3 AOL Inc. will not intentionally monitor or disclose any private
electronic communication unless permitted or required by law. AOL Inc.
may terminate immediately without notice any Member who misuses or fails
to abide by the TOS, including, without limitation, misuse of the
software libraries, discussion boards, E-Mail, or conference areas.
>>ALEWINE@DCEZ.COM
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 8 Jun 1996 00:18:35 -0500
From: critcrim@SUN.SOCI.NIU.EDU(Critical Criminology - ASA)
Subject: File 2--(S 1237) Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1995
((MODERATORS' NOTE: This week, C-CSPAN televised the hearings of S
1237, which would greatly expand the definition of "child
pornography" in a way that some feel would restrict otherwise
protected expression of art, literature, and even communication of
fantasy. Below is the text of the Bill)).
Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1995 (Introduced in the Senate)
S 1237 IS
104th CONGRESS
1st Session
S. 1237
To amend certain provisions of law relating to child pornography, and
for other purposes.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
SEPTEMBER 13 (LEGISLATIVE DAY, SEPTEMBER 5), 1995
Mr. HATCH (for himself, Mr. ABRAHAM, Mr. GRASSLEY, and Mr. THURMOND)
introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to
the Committee on the Judiciary
_________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To amend certain provisions of law relating to child pornography, and
for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United
States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the `Child Pornography Prevention Act of
1995'.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
Congress finds that--
(1) the use of children in the production of sexually explicit
material, including photographs, films, videos, computer
images, and other visual depictions, is a form of sexual
abuse which can result in physical or psychological harm, or
both, to the children involved;
(2) child pornography permanently records the victim's abuse, and
its continued existence causes the child victims of sexual
abuse continuing harm by haunting those children in future
years;
(3) child pornography is often used as part of a method of
seducing other children into sexual activity; a child who is
reluctant to engage in sexual activity with an adult, or to
pose for sexually explicit photographs, can sometimes be
convinced by viewing depictions of other children `having
fun' participating in such activity;
(4) prohibiting the possession and viewing of child pornography
encourages the possessors of such material to destroy them,
thereby helping to protect the victims of child pornography
and to eliminate the market for the sexually exploitative use
of children; and
(5) the elimination of child pornography and the protection of
children from sexual exploitation provide a compelling
governmental interest for prohibiting the production,
distribution, possession, or viewing of child pornography.
SEC. 3. DEFINITIONS.
Section 2256 of title 18, United States Code, is amended--
(1) in paragraph (2)(E), by inserting before the semicolon the
following: `, or the buttocks of any minor, or the breast of
any female minor';
(2) in paragraph (5), by inserting before the semicolon the
following: `, and data stored on computer disk or by
electronic means which is capable of conversion into a visual
image';
(3) in paragraph (6), by striking `and';
(4) in paragraph (7), by striking the period and inserting `;
and'; and
(5) by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
`(8) `child pornography' means any visual depiction, including
any photograph, film, video, picture, drawing, or computer or
computer-generated image or picture, whether made or produced
by electronic, mechanical, or other means, of sexually
explicit conduct, where--
`(A) the production of such visual depiction involves the
use of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct;
`(B) such visual depiction is, or appears to be, of a minor
engaging in sexually explicit conduct; or
`(C) such visual depiction is advertised, promoted,
presented, described, or distributed in such a manner
that conveys the impression that the material is or
contains a visual depiction of a minor engaging in
sexually explicit conduct.'.
SEC. 4. PROHIBITED ACTIVITIES RELATING TO MATERIAL CONSTITUTING OR CONTAINING
CHILD PORNOGRAPHY.
(a) IN GENERAL- Section 2252 of title 18, United States Code, is
amended to read as follows:
`Sec. 2252. Certain activities relating to material constituting or
containing child pornography
`(a) Any person who--
`(1) knowingly mails, transports, or ships in interstate or
foreign commerce by any means, including by computer, any
child pornography;
`(2) knowingly receives or distributes--
`(A) any child pornography that has been mailed, shipped, or
transported in interstate or foreign commerce by any
means, including by computer; or
`(B) any material that contains child pornography that has
been mailed, shipped, or transported in interstate or
foreign commerce by any means, including by computer;
`(3) knowingly reproduces any child pornography for distribution
through the mails, or in interstate or foreign commerce by
any means, including by computer;
`(4) either--
`(A) in the maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the
United States, or on any land or building owned by,
leased to, or otherwise used by or under the control of
the United States Government, or in the Indian country
(as defined in section 1151), knowingly sells or
possesses with the intent to sell any child pornography;
or
`(B) knowingly sells or possesses with the intent to sell
any child pornography that has been mailed, shipped, or
transported in interstate or foreign commerce by any
means, including by computer, or that was produced using
materials that have been mailed, shipped, or transported
in interstate or foreign commerce by any means,
including by computer; or
`(5) either--
`(A) in the maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the
United States, or on any land or building owned by,
leased to, or otherwise used by or under the control of
the United States Government, or in the Indian country
(as defined in section 1151), knowingly possesses 3 or
more books, magazines, periodicals, films, videotapes,
computer disks, or any other material that contains any
child pornography; or
`(B) knowingly possesses 3 or more books, magazines,
periodicals, films, videotapes, computer disks, or any
other material that contains any child pornography that
has been mailed, shipped, or transported in interstate
or foreign commerce by any means, including by computer,
shall be punished as provided in subsection (b).
`(b)(1) Whoever violates, or attempts or conspires to violate,
paragraphs (1), (2), (3), or (4) of subsection (a) shall be fined
under this title or imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both,
but, if such person has a prior conviction under this chapter or
chapter 109A, such person shall be fined under this title and
imprisoned for not less than 5 years nor more than 15 years.
`(2) Whoever violates paragraph (5) of subsection (a) shall be fined
under this title or imprisoned for not more than 5 years, or
both.'.
(b) TECHNICAL AMENDMENT- The table of sections for chapter 110 of
title 18, United States Code, is amended by amending the item
relating to section 2252 to read as follows:
`2252. Certain activities relating to material constituting or
containing child pornography.'.
SEC. 5. PRIVACY PROTECTION ACT AMENDMENTS.
Section 101 of the Privacy Protection Act of 1980 (42 U.S.C. 2000aa)
is amended--
(1) in subsection (a)(1), by inserting before the semicolon at
the end the following: `, or if the offense involves the
production, possession, receipt, mailing, sale, distribution,
shipment, or transportation of child pornography, the sexual
exploitation of children, or the sale or purchase of children
under section 2251, 2251A, or 2252 of title 18, United States
Code'; and
(2) in subsection (b)(1), by inserting before the semicolon at
the end the following: `, or if the offense involves the
production, possession, receipt, mailing, sale, distribution,
shipment, or transportation of child pornography, the sexual
exploitation of children, or the sale or purchase of children
under section 2251, 2251A, or 2252 of title 18, United States
Code'.
SEC. 6. SEVERABILITY.
If any provision of this Act, an amendment made by this Act, or the
application of such provision or amendment to any person or
circumstance is held to be unconstitutional, the remainder of this
Act, the amendments made by this Act, and the application of such
to any other person or circumstance shall not be affected thereby.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 12 Jun 1996 04:24:02 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Brock N. Meeks" <brock@WELL.COM>
Subject: File 3--"The One that got Away" Port (Brock Meeks)
CyberWire Dispatch // Copyright (c) 1996 //
Jacking in from the "One that Got Away" Port:
Washington, DC -- President Clinton call your spooks, get FBI Director
Louis Freeh on the phone. Tell them to order in pizza. Bill, it's
going to be a long night. All your plans to hold the U.S. crypto
market hostage have just been fucked... and you didn't even get kissed.
A virtual tactical nuke was hurled into the arcane subculture of
encryption technology Monday when RSA President Jim Bidzos revealed
that his company's Japanese subsidiary had developed the underlying
code for a monster chipset to be manufactured by NTT, the Japanese
telecom giant. Bidzos said the chipset will be capable of scrambling
voice and data real time with a so-called "key length" of up to 1024
bits.
That key length stuff is just so much gibberish to those playing
without a scorecard, so let me drill down on it for you. Basically,
the longer the key length, the harder it is for a message to be broken
by "brute force" automated attacks. Current U.S. laws prohibit the
export of any encryption device with a key length longer than 40-bits,
or roughly the equivalent of Captain Crunch decoder ring. Although
it's not possible to make direct comparisons between a public key
system, like RSA, and private key systems, such as the exportable
40-bit encryption, the 1024-bit key RSA scrambling scheme is a hell of
a lot tougher to break and it makes the Feds uneasy.
Bidzos, speaking during lunchtime at the Electronic Privacy Information
Center (EPIC) 6th Cryptography and Privacy conference, told how his
Japanese based company, Nihon-RSA, developed a set of two chips capable
of scrambling messages at a level that will make the spooks in the
Puzzle Palace (the National Security Administration) cough up hair
balls that would make the First Cat Socks envious.
Bidzos seems to have found crypto's magic bullet; a legit way to
essentially give the finger to U.S. export laws for crypto product. For
years now the White House has been locked into a kind of crypto war.
The Administration insists that strong encryption products must not be
exported for fear that "terrorists, child pornographers and drug
barons" and a rabble of assorted "bad guys" would snag the technology
and proceed to plot the destruction of the "World As We Know It"... or
at least Western Democracy, if the inbred Iranians got in line first.
The White House crypto-fascist team, led by the NSA, FBI and assorted
military hawks, have offered braindead compromise plans, including
three versions of the "Clipper Chip." This is a plan whereby you can
buy strong locks for your data with the simple caveat that when you buy
and use the products, you have to put the decoding key "in escrow."
This way if a law enforcement agency ever has the need to unscramble
any of your messages -- without you knowing it -- they can simply ask
for these escrowed keys and have them handed over. Yes, even your
local sheriff's department can ask for the keys.
Now, the government promises it will use this power only for good and
never for evil. Honest, that's what they say. Of course, the Justice
Department, in writing the rules for getting the keys, totally absolves
any law enforcement agency of all harm if this power is abused in any
way. Oh.. and if that power is abused, the sheriff or the FBI or
fucking Park Police for that matter, can still use any "evidence" they
gin up on you. Honest, I'm not making any of this stuff up.
So the battle has raged. The industry has been loathe to develop such
products only for the American market because the cost of producing
essentially duplicate products for domestic and foreign markets just
wouldn't be cost effective.
So, you and I are stuck having to use some pretty tedious encryption
technologies, such as PGP (Pretty Good Privacy), which is great, but
tough to use. Or we can use the Captain Crunch Decoder ring
equivalents available off the shelf. In the meantime, other countries
are happily making and distributing robust encryption technologies, at
a possible loss of up to $60 billion for U.S. companies, at least if
industry is to be believed (okay... I see you all laughing...)
Bidzos, tired of fighting the wars here, enlisted the help of the
Japanese. After setting up his Japanese unit, he hired a crack team
of Japanese crypto experts who essentially "reverse engineered" the
company's own U.S. crypto product, according to Kurt Stammberger, RSA
director of technology marketing. It was a brilliant move. Bidzos
can't be slammed by the State Department for violating crypto export
laws because, well, he didn't export a damn thing, except some U.S.
greenbacks, which of course, could have gone to U.S. cryptographers,
but let's not quibble about jobs.
Anyone want to kick around the subject of global competitiveness?
What's happened here is the Japanese have now trumped the entire world
on the crypto market. What's more, Clinton's brain-dead allegiance to
the FBI, et al., has now allowed the Japanese government, which still
owns a large share of NTT, which owns a minority share of RSA's
Japanese subsidiary, to have a lock on the world's strongest encryption
technology. Can you say "Remember the VCR" or "Remember the
Semiconductor" or how about "Thanks, Bill. We're fucked."
The boys in the Pentagon made a stink a few years ago when a Japanese
company made a play for Fairchild, a top defense contractor. It was
feared that the Japanese, by swallowing up the U.S. company, would also
gain access to technologies vital to the U.S. military. The deal was
squashed. Natch... now it looks like the G.I.'s with the stars on
their shoulders have just put their spit-shined combat boots up their
own ass by supporting Clinton and his continued ban on crypto exports.
"We truly have ceded this market Japanese companies," Bidzos said.
"It's almost too late to turn it around." Some 15 COUNTRIES have
already placed orders for these chips, Bidzos said, adding that the
Japanese will not build the chips with a key escrow function.
EPIC Director Marc Rotenberg said he was told by a Japanese
representative that the country's constitution wouldn't allow key
escrow because it doesn't allow wire-tapping. Umm... maybe the
Japanese just don't have *really* bad guys like the FBI assumes we have
here.
What's more, Bidzos says the deal with NTT is "no coup." He says the
Germans and French "aren't far behind" in developing similar
technologies. The RSA bombshell "fuels the argument that this stuff
can't be contained in our own borders," said PGP's Zimmermann.
Just how the relationship between NTT and RSA works out isn't set,
Bidzos acknowledged. "They'll pay us a royalty for the chips they
sell," he said. "We're working it all out."
Meanwhile, from my office window here in DC I've already counted 17
Domino's Pizza delivery bikes go screaming by on their way to the White
House. Through my telescope I can see the White House balcony; it
looks like Bill is sick, like he's just heard some "really bad news."
And behind him, just inside the double-doors, on a persian rug placed
there by Warren G. Harding, I think Socks the Cat has just coughed up a
hairball... or maybe it was Louis Freeh. From this angle, I just can't
be sure.
Meeks out...
------------
Additional reporting by Declan McCullagh (declan@well.com)
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 4 Jun 96 21:42:50 PDT
From: Jonathan Blumen <us003275@pop3.interramp.com>
Subject: File 4--Religious right and the Net
THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT AND INTERNET CENSORSHIP
by Jonathan Wallace jw@bway.net
(This article appeared in the May issue of Freedom Writer, the
newsletter of ther Institute for First Amendment Studies.)
A trial taking place in Philadelphia now will determine the
constitutionality of the Communications Decency Act (CDA), a federal
law passed last fall which criminalizes the online "depiction or
description" of sexual acts and organs. By its terms, the CDA
permits regulation of electronic text far beyond what is permissible
for books and magazines under the First Amendment. In the back of
the courtroom, representatives of the religious right, such as
ex-prosecutor Bruce Taylor of the National Law Center for Children
and Families, are monitoring each day of the trial with intent
interest.
Why are they there? Not only is the CDA an extension of the
religious right's campaign to dictate moral standards in traditional
media; the CDA itself is a creature of the religious right, which
had a significant hand in sculpting it, lining up politicians to
support it, and then supplying them with the ammunition they needed
to get it passed.
Soon after the Republicans released their Contract with America, the
Christian Coalition responded with its Contract with the American
Family; item 10 called for strict regulation of the Internet to
protect minors against sexual material. Bruce Taylor responded to
the Christian Coalition's call. Taylor prosecuted more than sixty
obscenity cases during his tenure with the Department of Justice,
before leaving to become Executive Director of the National Law
Center for Children and Families. Working behind the scenes advising
Nebraska Senator James J. Exon, a conservative Democrat who had made
the issue of Internet indecency his own, Taylor helped draft the
CDA, first introduced by Exon during 1994. The bill expired that
year but succeeded in becoming law in 1995, after the election of a
Republican majority with ties to the religious right.
On June 12, 1995, the Senate initiated debate on the CDA with a
prayer by the Senate chaplain, Dr. Lloyd John Ogilvie: "Almighty
God, Lord of all life, we praise You for the advancements in
computerized communications that we enjoy in our time. Sadly,
however, there are those who are littering this information
superhighway with obscene, indecent, and destructive pornography."
Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont, foremost adversary of the CDA,
later commented that the Chaplain should "allow us to debate these
issues and determine how they come out and maybe pray for our
guidance, but allow us to debate them. He may find that he has
enough other duties, such as composing a prayer each morning for us,
to keep him busy."
The entire Senate debate, spearheaded by Senator Exon and
Republicans Dan Coats and Charles Grassley, was informed by the
sensibilities of the religious right. The Senators read letters from
the Christian Coalition and from Bruce Taylor into the record. More
significantly, they flaunted statistics from the notorious Marty
Rimm "cyberporn" study two weeks before it was released in an
exclusive article in the July 3rd Time magazine. Apparently, the
proponents of the CDA had been given a preview of the study's
contents.
Mike Godwin, staff counsel to the Electronic Frontier Foundation,
believes that the religious right acted as the conduit between the
Georgetown Law Journal, then preparing the Rimm study for
publication, and the pro-censorship Senators. Godwin discovered that
as early as November 1994, Bruce Taylor was assisting Marty Rimm,
then a junior at Carnegie Mellon, in preparing his study, a thesis
project. Deen Kaplan, a Georgetown Law student and editor of the Law
Journal, shared office space with Taylor in a complex which also
housed the National Coalition for Children and Families and Donna
Rice's organization, Enough is Enough. Another protege of Taylor's,
John McMickle, was now on Senator Grassley's staff, and assisted him
in drafting his own Internet indecency legislation. Deen Kaplan
compiled Senator Exon's "Blue Book" of Internet pornography, which
he brandished to great effect during the Senate discussions.
On June 14, Senator Coats of Indiana announced in the Senate that
there were 450,000 pornographic images and text files on the Net,
which had been accessed 6.4 million times in the last year. Although
he did not give the source of these statistics, they came directly
from the still-secret Rimm study. After its release in July, the
cyberporn study was quickly discredited as a scientific document and
revealed to be the publicity-seeking stunt of a University
undergraduate, but the damage it caused continues: the Department of
Justice introduced it in evidence in the current trial of the CDA.
Ironically, the author soon tried to distance himself from the use
the religious right made of his study. Ralph Reed of the Christian
Coalition had praised the study on Nightline. Marty Rimm responded:
"Frankly, my sense is that things are getting blown out of
proportion because people are angry that the study will be
misappropriated. Their concerns are indeed well-founded. For
instance, Ralph Reed stated on Nightline that According to the
Carnegie Mellon University survey, one-quarter of all the images
involve the torture of women. This is simply untrue; the Carnegie
Mellon study does not report any results concerning torture. Many
others on Capitol Hill have misappropriated the study as well."
Some Congressmen privately told constituents that they had no choice
but to vote for a law which they believed the courts would later
hold unconstitutional; the Senate passed the CDA by a vote of 86-14.
The next day, Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition exulted: "We are
proud and honored that the first item of the Contract With The
American Family that passed either house of Congress is designed to
protect our children... We applaud Senators Coats and Exon for their
decisive step forward to protect our nation's youth from the real
threat of cyber-porn, and we look forward to swift action in the
House."
For a while, it looked as if the CDA would be defeated in the House,
where Speaker Gingrich had announced that it was unconstitutional.
The CDA was never reported out of committee, and the House made a
show of passing the Cox-Wyden amendment, which lauded the Internet
and announced that the FCC would never have any role in regulating
it. However, in a remarkable manipulation of the procedural rules,
Congressman Henry Hyde of Illinois, another long-time supporter of
the religious right's agenda, added his own version of Internet
indecency language to the Telecommunications Reform Act in a last
minute "manager's mark amendment." This swept to victory shortly
afterwards as the House endorsed the Telcom act, with most
legislators completely unaware that Congressman Hyde had tacked it
on to the bill. The next day, Ralph Reed said, apropos of this and
other legislative developments: "We are on a roll.... We never
expected to make so much progress so quickly... Our grassroots will
stay engaged until the final item is passed and signed by this or a
future president." He made no mention of the unsavory way in which
Congressman Hyde had resuscitated a law declared dead by the
Speaker. A House-Senate conference commitee reconciled the Exon and
Hyde versions, and later that fall, President Clinton signed the
telcom bill, including the CDA, into law.
The religious right is not resting on its laurels. In addition to
attending the Philadelphia case, it has taken to the media with an
aggressive defense of the CDA. A few weeks ago, I debated
ex-prosecutor Patrick Trueman, now legislative affairs director for
the American Family Association, on NBC's America's Talking cable
network. Trueman called the Internet "depraved" and accused me of
wanting "to let the perverts go." Shortly after, he released a
letter to the press in which he called for the prosecution of the
Compuserve online service under the CDA for its alleged hosting of
pornographic images.
In her fine 1993 history of American arts censorship, ACLU attorney
Marjorie Heins wrote that "the message of religiously based
'profamily' leaders like Reverend Donald Wildmon of the American
Family Association or Pat Robertson of the Christian Coalition was
not merely that their views on sexuality, women's rights,
reproductive freedom, and religion were correct, but that other
views should not even be heard." These two organizations, and others
like them, have now mounted a pre-emptive strike against the
Internet.
Jonathan Wallace, a software executive and attorney, is co-author
with Mark Mangan of Sex, Laws and Cyberspace, a book about Internet
censorship (Henry Holt, 1996) (http://www.spectacle.org/freespch/).
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 21 Mar 1996 22:51:01 CST
From: CuD Moderators <cudigest@sun.soci.niu.edu>
Subject: File 5--Cu Digest Header Info (unchanged since 7 Apr, 1996)
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End of Computer Underground Digest #8.47
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