________________ _______________ _______________ /_______________/\ /_______________\ /\______________\ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/ ||||||||||||||||| / //////////////// \\\\\________/\ |||||________\ / /////______\ \\\\\\\\\\\\\/____ |||||||||||||| / ///////////// \\\\\___________/\ ||||| / //// \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/ ||||| \//// e c t o r _________________________________________________________________________ EFFector Vol. 10, No. 06 June 26, 1997 editor@eff.org A Publication of the Electronic Frontier Foundation ISSN 1062-9424 IN THIS ISSUE: Supreme Court Unanimously Strikes Down CDA Upcoming Events Quote of the Day What YOU Can Do Administrivia * See http://www.eff.org/hot.html for more information on current EFF activities and online activism alerts! * ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Supreme Court Unanimously Strikes Down CDA --------------------------------------------------- This is not just a victory for the Internet -- it's a victory for all Americans, everywhere. The Court has reaffirmed that we can be trusted to make our own content choices for ourselves and for our children, and that speech on the Internet should be no less restricted than speech in the New York Times or the Boston Globe. To quote Alexander Meiklejohn's comment more than 30 years ago about a different but equally important First Amendment decision (New York Times Inc. v. Sullivan), the Court's ruling today is "an occasion for dancing in the streets." Press Release June 26, 1997 Electronic Frontier Foundation Statement: Supreme Court Victory for Free Speech: CDA Ruled Unconstitutional Contacts: Mike Godwin, Staff Counsel, +1 415 436 9333 or 1 510 548 3290 Stanton McCandlish, Program Director, +1 415 436 9333 Shari Steele, Staff Counsel, +1 301 375 8856 Washington, DC -- "As a matter of constitutional tradition, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, we presume that governmental regulation of the content of speech is more likely to interfere with the free exchange of ideas than to encourage it. The interest in encouraging freedom of expression in a democratic society outweighs any theoretical but unproven benefit of censorship." With this ringing reaffirmation of the American people's fundamental right to freedom of expression, the United States Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the Communications Decency Amendment censorship provisions of the Telecommunications Reform Act of 1996 regarding so-called "indecent" content are unconstitutional on their face, and that free speech on the Internet merits the highest standards of Constitutional protection. The decision marks a major victory in the Electronic Frontier Foundation's ongoing efforts to ensure that the long-standing American principles of freedom of expression be preserved and extended to the Internet. The extremely broad reach that the CDA would have had was reflected in the range of plaintiffs who joined together to challenge the law. The EFF was a leading party in a coalition comprising such diverse organizations as Apple, Microsoft, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, Barnes & Noble, and journalists such as Brock Meeks, in challenging the Communications Decency Amendment (CDA) which would have banned a broad range of First Amendment-protected speech from the public spaces of the Internet. These groups are united today in celebration of the Supreme Court's decision to strike down a law that would have criminalized this constitutionally protected speech on the Internet and other online forums. The Court's ruling in Reno v. ACLU affirmed the unanimous decisions of Philadelphia and New York federal courts, rejecting the controversial "decency" amendment to the Telecommunications Reform Act of 1996 as an unconstitutional violation of the First Amendment. The Court's opinion firmly establishes that the Constitution's guarantees of freedom of speech and of the press apply on the Internet. Members of the technology and publishing industries, as well as civil liberties watchdog groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the ACLU, hailed the Court's decision as a victory for everyone who uses computer communications. "Today marks a victory for all Americans, and we think it's appropriate for everyone to celebrate the Court's recognition of the free-speech significance of the Internet," said Lori Fena, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. "What this means is that the responsibility for controlling our content lies on us -- the citizens and the parents -- and this is a call for all of us once again to demonstrate how we can trusted to use this medium responsibly," she said. "This means that the parents, rather than the government, are empowered to make the choices about Internet content." Mike Godwin, EFF staff counsel, stated, "The CDA would have abridged one of the freedoms that Americans treasure most, and a freedom that is central to any democratic society. The Supreme Court recognized, as had the District Court, that this law was a wholly inappropriate exercise of governmental power under the Constitution." Esther Dyson, EFF chairman, noted that the decision stands for one of EFF's principal positions regarding free speech online: "We believe in free speech at the source -- and in the empowerment of any audience for that speech to control what they see and hear. "The Court's decision takes the responsibility for controlling and accessing speech on the Net out of the hands of government and puts it back where it belongs: in the hands of parents and other individuals," she said. "Individuals have the technical means to make their own choices about what they and their children read and see," Dyson noted. EFF has long noted that such low-cost technical solutions, together with existing anti-obscenity laws, offer a less intrusive and more efficient answer to questions about protecting children in the online world. "The government kept saying that this was a crisis that required harsher censorship in the online world than in any other communication medium," Godwin said. "In fact, EFF and the other plaintiffs in this case showed that it's possible to promote both freedom of speech and family values -- that the two goals don't oppose each other. By its decision today, the Court expressly acknowledged that reality." The constitutional challenge to the Communications Decency Act was grounded in a series of basic arguments, including that law is unconstitutionally overbroad (criminalizing protected speech), and that it it is unconstitutionally vague (making it difficult for individuals and organizations to comply). The Court also reaffirmed the lower court's findings a) that the character of this new medium means that any attempt at content regulation for the Internet must meet the strictest Constitutional requirements under the First Amendment, and b) that filtering technologies provided a less restrictive means to achieve Congress's stated goal of protecting children. "We applaud today's Supreme Court decision declaring the CDA unconstitutional," said Michael Sears, vice president and general manager of SurfWatch Software, a division of Spyglass Inc. "After our testimony in Philadelphia last year, I believe that we convinced the court that parental control software like SurfWatch is a much more effective and less restrictive solution than excessive government regulation." Referring to the Court's four-decade-old anti-censorship decision in Butler v. Michigan, the Supreme Court stated the speech restriction at issue there amounted to "burn[ing] the house to roast the pig." In his opinion for the Court, Associate Justice John Paul Stevens wrote that "[t]he CDA, casting a far darker shadow over free speech, threatens to torch a large segment of the Internet community." ------------------------------ Subject: Upcoming Events ------------------------ This schedule lists EFF events, and those we feel might be of interest to our members. EFF events (those sponsored by us or featuring an EFF speaker) are marked with a "*" instead of a "-" after the date. Simlarly, government events (such as deadlines for comments on reports or testimony submission, or conferences at which government representatives are speaking) are marked with "!" in place of the "-" ("!?" means a govt. speaker may appear, but we don't know for certain yet.) And likewise, "+" in place of "-" indicates a non-USA event. If it's a foreign EFF event with govt. people, it'll be "*!+" instead of "-". You get the idea. To let us know about an event, please send details to Dennis Derryberry, dennis@eff.org, with a subject line containing "CALENDAR:" followed by the name of the event. The latest version of the full EFF calendar is available from: ftp: ftp.eff.org, /pub/EFF/calendar.eff gopher: gopher.eff.org, 1/EFF, calendar.eff http://www.eff.org/pub/EFF/calendar.eff See also our new Now-Up-to-Date HTML calendar at: http://events.eff.org 1997 July 13- 17 - ACUTA 26th Annual Conference; Atlanta, Georgia. Contact: +1 606 278 3338 (voice) Aug. 24 + NAGOYA, JAPAN - IJCAI-97 Workshop on AI in Digital Libraries: Moving From Chaos to (More) Order; Nagoya Congress Center, Nagoya, Japan; URL: http://www.dlib.com/people/innes/aiindl/cfp.html Sep. 7 - 11 + LANCASTER, UK - ECSCW'97, the Fifth European Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work; deadline for paper submissions is January 13, 1997; papers must contain an abstract of not more than 100 words and not exceed 16 pages in length; full formatting instructions are available from http://www.comp.lancs.ac.uk/computing/research/cseg/ecscw97/papers/ queries: ecscw97-papers@comp.lancs.ac.uk for more information: snail mail: ECSCW'97 Conference Office Computing Department Lancaster University Lancaster LA1 4YR UK URL: http://www.comp.lancs.ac.uk/computing/research/cseg/ecscw97/ email: ecscw97@comp.lancs.ac.uk Sep. 12- 14 SAN DIEGO - Association of Online Professionals Annual Conference; sysop trade association's yearly gathering to discuss issues of relevance to the industry URL: http://www.aop.org/confrnc.html Sep. 25- 27 + PRAGUE, CZECHOSLOVAKIA - RUFIS'97: Role of Universities in the Future Information Society; Czech Technical University, Prague, Czechoslovakia; to obtain a registration form, please, send an empty e-mail message to: rufis-call@mail.vc.cvut.cz Karel Kveton UNESCO International Centre for Scientific Computing Czech Technical University - Prague Computing Centre Zikova 4, 166 35 Prague 6 Phone: + 42 2 2431 0369, fax: + 42 2 311 7529 e-mail: kveton@vc.cvut.cz URL: http://www.cvut.cz/RUFIS97 Oct. 7- 10 + BEIJING, CHINA - '97 China Database: Electronic Publications & Software Exhibition; Beijing International Convention Center Contact: Mr. Cheng Bin and Ms. Hu Yongning Beijing Evertrust Exposition Co. Ltd. 15 Fuxing Road, Beijing, China Post code: 100038 Tel: +86-10-68514007 Fax: +86-10-68537092 URL: http: // www.sti.ac. cn/Exhibition/ invi.htm E-mail: expo@istic.sti.ac.cn Oct. 28- 31 - EDUCOM '97; Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota. Contact: +1 202 872 4200 (voice) Email: conf@educom.edu Dec. 1 - Computer Security Day (started by Washington DC chapter of the Assoc. for Computing Machinery, to "draw attention to computer security during the holdiay season when it might otherwise become lax." 1998 ---- July 12- 16 - ACUTA 27th Annual Conference; San Diego, California. Contact: +1 606 278 3338 (voice) Oct. 13- 16 - EDUCOM '98; Orlando, Florida. Contact: +1 202 872 4200 (voice) Email: conf@educom.edu Dec. 1 - Computer Security Day (started by Washington DC chapter of the Assoc. for Computing Machinery, to "draw attention to computer security during the holdiay season when it might otherwise become lax." ------------------------------ Subject: Quote of the Day ------------------------- "The State insists that, by thus quarantining the general reading public against books not too rugged for grown men and women in order to shield juvenile innocence, it is exercising its power to promote the general welfare. Surely this is to burn the house to roast the pig...The incidence of this enactment is to reduce the adult population of Michigan to reading only what is fit for children." - US Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter, _Butler_v._Michigan_, 352 U.S. 380, 383 (1957) Find yourself wondering if your privacy and freedom of speech are safe when bills to censor the Internet are swimming about in a sea of of surveillance legislation and anti-terrorism hysteria? Worried that in the rush to make us secure from ourselves that our government representatives may deprive us of our essential civil liberties? Concerned that legislative efforts nominally to "protect children" will actually censor all communications down to only content suitable for the playground? Alarmed by commercial and religious organizations abusing the judicial and legislative processes to stifle satire, dissent and criticism? Join EFF! http://www.eff.org/join (or send any message to info@eff.org). You *know* privacy, freedom of speech and ability to make your voice heard in government are important. You have probably participated in our online campaigns and forums. Have you become a member of EFF yet? The best way to protect your online rights is to be fully informed and to make your opinions heard. EFF members are informed and are making a difference. Join EFF today! Even if you don't live in the U.S., the anti-Internet hysteria will soon be visiting a legislative body near you. If it hasn't already. ------------------------------ Subject: What YOU Can Do ------------------------ * Keep an eye on your local legislature/parliament! All kinds of wacky censorious legislation is turning up at the US state and non-US national levels. Don't let it sneak by you - or by the online activism community. Without locals on the look out, it's very difficult for the Net civil liberties community to keep track of what's happening locally as well as globally. * Inform your corporate government affairs person or staff counsel if you have one. Keep them up to speed on developments you learn of, and let your company's management know if you spot an issue that warrants your company's involvement. * Find out who your legislators are Writing letters to, faxing, and phoning your representatives in Congress is one very important strategy of activism, and an essential way of making sure YOUR voice is heard on vital issues. If you are having difficulty determining who your US legislators are, try contacting your local League of Women Voters, who maintain a great deal of legislator information, or consult the free ZIPPER service that matches ZIP Codes to Congressional districts with about 85% accuracy at: http://www.voxpop.org/zipper/ This can be double-checked with the House's own lookup service, at: http://www.house.gov/writerep/ Computer Currents Interactive has provided Congress contact info, sorted by who voted for and against the Communications Decency Act: http://www.currents.net/congress.html (NB: Some of these folks have, fortunately, been voted out of office.) We are not presently aware of servers that provide contact info for US state-level legislators, or non-US lawmakers. ------------------------------ Administrivia ============= EFFector is published by: The Electronic Frontier Foundation 1550 Bryant St., Suite 725 San Francisco CA 94103 USA +1 415 436 9333 (voice) +1 415 436 9993 (fax) Membership & donations: membership@eff.org Legal services: ssteele@eff.org General EFF, legal, policy or online resources queries: ask@eff.org Editor: Stanton McCandlish, Program Director/Webmaster (mech@eff.org) This newsletter is printed on 100% recycled electrons. Reproduction of this publication in electronic media is encouraged. Signed articles do not necessarily represent the views of EFF. To reproduce signed articles individually, please contact the authors for their express permission. Press releases and EFF announcements may be reproduced individ- ually at will. 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