WASHINGTON — A bill that would punish people who create obscene material for distribution on computer networks passed a key Senate committee vote Thursday. It immediately drew criticism from the Clinton Administration, on-line businesses and civil liberties groups as a potential threat to freedom of speech.
The Communications Decency Act would impose jail terms and fines on people or companies who originate public on-line material that is deemed "obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, or indecent." It would also penalize solicitation of such material. The bill does not define those terms, long the subject of legal battling.
The measure's sponsor, Sen. J. James Exon, (D-Neb.), said he introduced it to protect minors from pornographic material that is found on many on-line services. "I want to keep the information superhighway from resembling a red-light district," he has said.
Sen. Slade Gorton (R-Wash.), a co-sponsor, said "it extends to computer users the same protections that currently exist for telephone users" against obscene phone calls.
The federal government has long enforced rules against obscene material being broadcast by radio or TV stations. The bill would extend similar provisions into the fast-growing and largely unregulated on-line communications, where tens of millions of people worldwide sit at computers and trade electronic information.
Computer networks help children do homework, scientists conduct research and loved ones stay in touch. But users can also use their equipment to connect to databases that contain sexually oriented electronic pictures and stories for display on computer screens. The Internet computer network, for instance, has publicly accessible areas where photos and typed discussions of bestiality and sadomasochism are available.
The bill would instruct the Federal Communications Commission to devise ways to bar such material. Enforcement of the penalties of up to two years in prison and fines of up to $100,000 would likely be handled by the Department of Justice. State and local governments could pass and enforce complementary restrictions.
Exon's bill, included in a broad telecommunications reform package passed Thursday by the Senate Commerce Committee, has angered civil liberties groups and companies hoping to build businesses around the information highway.
