Telecom Trends

Michael Geist points to a private member's bill introduced by Liberal MP Karen Redman last Thursday. Named the The Internet Child Pornography Prevention Act, the bill seeks to license all ISPs and have those ISPs adhere to some new guideines. In my view, it is well intentioned, but flawed.

The purpose of the bill is clear enough:

The purpose of this Act is to prevent the use of the Internet to unlawfully promote, display, describe or facilitate participation in unlawful sexual activity involving young persons.

The measures seek to place more responsibility onto internet service providers.

The bill introduces a CRTC licensing regime.

No person shall offer the services of, or operate as, an Internet service provider unless the person has been granted a licence to operate as an Internet service provider

This is not particularly onerous. We have all sorts of telecom service provider licensing and registrations today already. Those ISPs who are already providing voice services need to register already. The bill does not define what is an ISP. Does it refer to internet access providers, hosting companies, both?

This bill would allow the Commission to block previous offenders from operating an ISP, or being a director or officer of an ISP. Further, the bill would permit the Minister to order ISPs to block certain content found to be child pornography. The current legislation only allows the CRTC to authorize the blocking of content - a subtle but important distinction.

Among the biggest challenges are the requirements in section 5(1):

No Internet service provider shall knowingly permit the use of its service

1. for placing child pornography on the Internet or for viewing, reading, copying or retrieving child pornography from the Internet;
2. by any person who the provider knows has been convicted of an offence under this Act within the previous seven years; or
3. by any person who the provider knows has used the Internet within the previous seven years for a purpose that would be an offence under this Act.

Other portions of the bill appear to be redundant with existing legislation, although the new bill uses conflicting language.

South of the border, last week Congressman Ed Markey (D-Mass) introduced the Internet Freedom Preservation Act. Markey chairs the House Subcommittee on Telecommunication and the Internet, so his bill is more likely to generate active debate, especially since his bill is co-sponsored by Republican Chip Pickering.

There will be a session on Net Neutrality on Wednesday June 18 at The Canadian Telecom Summit.

Early bird rates end in less than two weeks on March 1. Book your place now!

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child pornography, net neutrality, Canadian Telecom Summit