Update: As of Wednesday morning, the charges against Fogle became more "serious". Follow the media.
Tuesday, August 18, 2015
Fogle will plead guilty in controversial and legally troubling child pornography possession case
There is more development of the news story of Jared Fogle,
who now will plead guilty to possession of child pornography, after his home
was raided, following the arrest in July of Russell C. Taylor. CNN has a detailed story by Dana Ford here. That story links to an earlier posting
by Mark O’Mara warning computer users that they can be held responsible for
child pornography placed on their devices by others (like roommates, spouses or children)
unless they can show they didn’t know.
As noted in some news stories in the summer of 2013, the possibility of
hacking (or malware) and defenses to it sounds troubling, even if actual
incidents are infrequent. Cases like
Fogles are sometimes discovered by monitoring for digital watermarks on the
Internet by CMEC in Alexandria, VA, but the government could become more
aggressive in monitoring “the cloud” in the future.
CNN covered the latest story on AC360 Tuesday night. Jeffrey Toobin reinforced what O’Mara says in
his July 2015 op-ed on CNN.
Update: As of Wednesday morning, the charges against Fogle became more "serious". Follow the media.
Update: As of Wednesday morning, the charges against Fogle became more "serious". Follow the media.
Monday, August 17, 2015
Reviewing the history of CPPA and "virtual child pornography"
When I saw the movie “The Diary of a Teenage Girl” Saturday
night (review Movies blog Sunday morning), I wondered if the images in the
film, purporting to be of a 15-year-old girl, could be illegal (child pornography). I presume that since the actress who played
her was actually 21, there would be no legal problem (as long as the production
company collected evidence of her age, which all reputable US, Canadian,
Australian and European movie studios do to comply with laws).
Previously I’ve covered COPPA and CIPA (as well as COPA) in
this blog, but some time back, in 1996, there was also a law called CPPA, the
Child Pornography Prevention Act, which was largely overturned by the Supreme
Court in 2002 (Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition). Some technicalities regarding expert
testimony remained, and then Congress muddied the waters again with the PROTECT
Act (Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to End the Exploitation of
Children), which would make the goading of customers a crime even if no real
minors were involved.
All of this is explained pretty thoroughly in a somewhat
rambling post by the First Amendment Center, “Virtual Child Pornography”, by
David L. Hudson, posted first in 2002 and updated in 2009. The article appears to show that, without the
Supreme Court’s overturning of CPPA, movies like “American Beauty” and “Traffic”,
let alone “Teenage Girl”, would be illegal.
The controversy over drawings or animations that simulate
child pornography would be similar as Congress has tried to outlaw it. If an actual minor had been the subject of
such a drawing or painting, that would still seem to make the work or
possessing it illegal.
The DOJ actually gives less detail in its own explanation.
Tuesday, August 04, 2015
UK activist proposes various child-protection measures like "delete buttons"; India enforces COPA-like measure on adults
A UK “peer” is calling for all websites allowing users to
add content have a “delete” button for those under 18. She wants rules to make the Internet more
suitable and welcoming for “young people”.
But most comment systems and social media already allow
users to delete their own posts now. And
it’s unclear how she would identify those under 18.
The story by Glyn Moody on Ars Technica is here.
The “baroness” wants young people to have other digital
rights, such as what others can do with their information. But the biggest right
should be digital education – to understand that what you put up probably can’t
be disappeared.
The story also mentions Google’s polite refusal to extend “the
right to be forgotten” to the whole world. One country can’t impose on another
one.
Along the lines of memories of COPA, India has suddenly cracked
down on porn sites, Washington Post story here. But the concern isn’t so much with “harmful
to minors” as “harmful to the unstable”, as it goes much further than US law
would allow with censhorship.
Saturday, August 01, 2015
Age verification issue with dating app leading to "sex offender" case in Michigan raises new questions about possible future COPA
A recent case where a teenager was plead out as a sex
offender (after brief jail sentence) when his female partner had lied about her
age, raises potential questions regarding any possible future COPA-like
laws. The female had told the boy that
she was 17 in messaging, when she was actually 14, and she had signed up on the
adult section (probably violating terms of service) of the “What’s Hot” dating app.
(I’m not sure which link from Google is correct given the information in
news stories; it seems to be a downloadable app for smart phones.)
The natural question is, could the app have verified her
age? We know from all the testimony of
the COPA trial (2007) that reliable age verification or adult-id systems were
viewed as insufficient at the time.
However, new biometric ID systems are appearing (especially with Windows
10). It’s logical to ask whether they
could be expected for dating sites, and ultimately for sites offering “adult”
content and whether this issue could be opened up again.
Biometric validation could be useful to sites like Facebook, in really ensuring that new users are old enough according to the site's policies.
The details of the Michigan case were posted today Aug. 1,
2015 on the TV Reviews blog (with story links).
Update: Sept 21
The judge has vacated the sentence, and it is like the mandatory s.o. registration will be removed.
Update: Sept 21
The judge has vacated the sentence, and it is like the mandatory s.o. registration will be removed.
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