cr> re: CDA and the Fourth Amendment

1996-02-24

Richard Moore

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Date: Thu, 22 Feb 1996
Sender: •••@••.•••
Subject: Re: CDA and the Fourth Amendment

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>I realize that litigation on this issue is impossible now as no civil
>plaintiff could vicariously raise the rights of a hypothetical criminal
>defendant.  Nevertheless, enforcement of the Exon and Hyde additions to the
>law appear impossible without bruising this essential right.  In short, how
>can the government possibly initiate an investigation of an electronic mail
>user without reading the mail?

The govt doesn't need to initiate investigations: since the CDA is
aimed at protecting minors, the parents or gaurdians of minors will
initiate suits againts violators of the CDA.  For instance, if you
send email to a minor (lets say George Carlin's "Seven words you
can't say on Television"); the parent of the minor might read his/her
child's email to make sure that he/she doesn't receive any indecent
mail; when the parent see's your message, they sue you.  Also, if
the minor you send the message to is offended by it, they can tell
they're parents, who will then sue.

Also, consider this: online services now offer the ability for parents
to control what their children get access to.  Why not give the
children their own mailboxes with their own passwords, and offer
the parents the service of keyword scanning each message of various
dirty words.  It would then forward these to the parents, along
with any binary attachments that the child might receive (since any
binary might be a pornographic picture).

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 Posted by Richard K. Moore  -  •••@••.•••  -  Wexford, Ireland
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