One
risk of having the world pay attention to a single, all-consuming story
is that less important but still urgent stories are missed along the
way. One such unfolding story in our domain is the (deep breath)
Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies
(“EARN IT”) Act, which was the subject of a Senate hearing on Wednesday. Here’s Alfred Ng with an explainer in CNET:
For
starters, it’s not clear that companies have to “earn” what are already
protections provided under the First Amendment: to publish, and to
allow their users to publish, with very few legal restrictions. But if
the EARN IT Act were passed, tech companies could be held liable if
their users posted illegal content. This would represent a significant
and potentially devastating amendment to Section 230, a much-misunderstood law that many consider a pillar of the internet and the businesses that operate on top of it.
When
internet companies become liable for what their users post, those
companies aggressively moderate speech. This was the chief outcome of
FOSTA-SESTA, the last bill Congress passed to amend Section 230. It was
putatively written to eliminate sex trafficking, and was passed into law
after Facebook endorsed it. I wrote about the aftermath in October:
Meanwhile,
evidence that the law reduced sex trafficking is suspiciously hard to
come by. And there is little reason to believe that the EARN IT Act will
be a greater boon to public life.
Yet, for the reasons Issie Lapowsky lays out today in a good piece in Protocol,
it may pass anyway. Once again Congress has lined up some sympathetic
witnesses who paint a picture that, because of their misfortune, whole
swathes of the internet should be eliminated.
To read Newton's entire article, click HERE.
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