From: Cu Digest (tk0jut2@mvs.cso.niu.edu) Date: Fri, 19 Apr 1996 14:39:43 -0800 From: telstar@wired.com (--Todd Lappin-->) Subject: File 5--Amer. Fam. Assoc. Demands investigation of Compuserve Although the courts are still debating the constitutionality of the Communications Decency Act, the Cyberporn Witch Hunt of 1996 is already getting underway... On April 1, 1996, the American Family Association -- a fundamentalist group based in Mississippi -- sent a letter to Attorney General Janet Reno demanding that the Department of Justice launch a criminal investigation of CompuServe. The letter, signed by Patrick A. Trueman, Director of Governmental Affairs for the AFA, reads as follows: "I am writing to urge a criminal investigation of H&R Block, Inc. and Compuserve for potential violations of the Communications Decency Act. CompuServe, a division of H&R Block, Inc., as of Friday, March 29, 1996, is offering pornography and other sexually oriented material on its on-line service to its users, including children... I hope that you will have an investigator review material available to children on CompuServe and take appropriate action." As Barry Steinhardt, Associate Director of the ACLU, explains in the following article, "This just proves what we've maintained all along: This law, this Communications Decency Act, is going to be a vehicle for the radical religious right to impose its brand of morality on the rest of the country." (Many thanks go out to the kind folks at the San Jose Mercury News for graciously giving me permission to redistribute the full text of this article to you now.) Read on for details, and of course... Work the network! --Todd Lappin--> Section Editor WIRED Magazine ---------------------------------------------------------------------- COMPUSERVE CALLED INDECENT CHRISTIAN GROUP SAYS ON-LINE SERVICE VIOLATES TELECOMMUNICATIONS ACT. By RORY J. O'CONNOR Mercury News Washington Bureau April 19, 1996 (Re-distributed by permission from the San Jose Mercury News: http://www.sjmercury.com) WASHINGTON -- A fundamentalist Christian group has demanded a federal criminal investigation of the CompuServe on-line service, alleging that it has violated anti-smut provisions in a recently enacted telecommunications law. The American Family Association, based in Tupelo, Miss., asked the Justice Department to investigate in an April 1 letter to Attorney General Janet Reno. The organization's letter is apparently the first complaint lodged under terms of the Communications Decency Act, a controversial part of the sweeping rewrite of U.S. telecommunications law passed in February. The law makes it a crime to transmit ''indecent'' material via computer in such a way that children might view it. The act, largely crafted by Sen. James Exon, D-Neb., was bitterly contested by computer users and civil libertarians. Proponents said the law would make cyberspace a safer place for children. Opponents said it would chill free speech on-line, criminalizing material that would be protected under the First Amendment if it were printed on paper. A group of plaintiffs, led by the American Civil Liberties Union, sued the Justice Department in February seeking to overturn the law as unconstitutional. The case is still pending. The department has agreed in court not to conduct formal investigations into violations of the law, or to indict or prosecute anyone under it, while the case is pending, a spokesman said. The AFA maintains the Communications Decency Act is far too weak and was gutted in Congress to placate computer industry interests. In the letter to the Justice Department, the group alleged CompuServe offers ''pornography and other sexually oriented materials . . . to its users, including children.'' The group singled out a service called Mac Glamour, an adult forum that, among other things, offers color photos of nude women. The service was promoted on CompuServe's ''What's New'' screen when subscribers connected at the end of March. CompuServe clearly marks the forum as an adult area and gives instructions to users how they can block the service from their computers. Among the controls provided by CompuServe, the main subscriber in a household, who must be an adult, can block access to adult sites from his or her account. The Mississippi group says that isn't sufficient. In a household that hadn't blocked the adult area, the invitation could have been seen and the images viewed by a minor, it said. ''This is exactly the kind of incident that Congress, in drafting the bill, anticipated,'' said Patrick Trueman, director of government affairs for the AFA in Washington. ''The objection we had was that it was available to children. If this isn't prosecutable, I don't know what is.'' CompuServe did not respond to repeated calls seeking comment. But an industry group representing on-line service providers, the Information Services Association, said the letter to Reno was designed to interfere in the pending court case. ''It's clearly a publicity device during an important juncture in the litigation,'' said Bob Smith, the association's executive director. He called the law's language a ''vague and unclear standard that could make a wide range of material, including medical information and certain literature, illegal as well.'' The Justice Department said it had received the letter but wouldn't act on it until the court case is over. The ACLU called the letter an attempt to coerce commercial services to remove otherwise legal adult material from their computers under threat of the large fines and prison terms spelled out in the act. ''This just proves what we've maintained all along: This law, this Communications Decency Act, is going to be a vehicle for the radical religious right to impose its brand of morality on the rest of the country,'' said Barry Steinhardt, associate director of the ACLU. ''They are going after Constitutionally protected images.'' Trueman readily acknowledged that the AFA considers the law too weak, and if the CompuServe case isn't prosecuted, ''it's time for Congress to start from scratch.'' He said on-line services should have to automatically block all adult material from view unless a subscriber specifically requests access to it. But civil libertarians and privacy advocates reject that approach, which is the subject of a New York court case concerning an adult public access cable TV channel. ''It would cause a rather large collection of personal data'' about users of adult services, said David Banisar, policy analyst for the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington. ''It would be a particularly explosive list that CompuServe could sell, with all sorts of ramifications.'' =A91996 Mercury Center.