Emerging Internet Regulation Trends

Posted on Jan 4, 2009 04:35:26 AM

In mid-2008, Rasmussen conducted a poll to find out how Americans felt about Internet regulation.  49% said that they thought the government should regulate the Internet in much the same way that it regulates radio and television.

This trend toward government regulation of the Internet is apparently due to fears about child pornography and other tasteless websites being available for children to view, as well as social networking abuse by predatory adults. 

A Glance at Censorship.

Censorship of Internet content is on the rise, and it is not just limited to communist China anymore.  By way of example, in the UK, a page within Wikipedia (and in some instances, the entire Wikipedia site) was blocked from UK web viewers because someone filed a complaint with the IWF, a quasi-governmental agency.  An album cover was viewed as offensive and inappropriate. Since it was a photo of a physical good, there was the possibility that Amazon’s US auction and shopping content would be blocked from UK viewers.

Within the censorship arena is the increasing volume of complaints from politicians who feel that blogs are not correctly reporting the facts about their campaigns or other political news.  Add to this mix the journalists and mainstream media who are seeing online content take a bite out of their readership and sales.  While news and political reporting are not currently regulated in the United States, it would not be surprising if politicians begin to talk about licensing requirements or some form of authority ranking for blog owners and other online reporters.

Nationwide Filtering.

Australia’s “great firewall” is a proposal that, if passed and if it becomes mandatory, will be the most obtrusive form of government control of the Internet in a democratized country.  Ostensibly for filtering out child pornography, the firewall has sparked intense debate, including free speech arguments.  The government reportedly will ban at least 1300 websites, but it has not disclosed exactly what sites are on the banned list.  Despite the fact that the filter is not totally accurate or effective, it slows down Internet speeds by up to 86%. 

Internet Taxation.

On a federal level in the United States, there have been rumors about Internet taxation for many years but nothing has come of it.  Many Americans, including Congressional representatives, are leery of an Internet sales tax.  Budget-challenged state governments, on the other hand, are eyeing the Internet as a source of revenue.  New York state, for instance, imposed various vendor and affiliate registration requirements that would make non-resident sellers responsible for reporting New York state sales taxes.  Amazon, which has a strong worldwide affiliate program, has sued and as of this writing, a decision has not been rendered.  Do not be shocked if Internet taxes become an issue in the near future.

Licensing and Disclosures.

Some legislators have talked about licensing Internet use.  Their reasoning is that is someone is required to have a license to drive a car on our nation’s highways, then it is not unreasonable to expect a person to get a license to surf the Internet’s information highway.  License requirements would include basic knowledge about anti-virus programs, email use and so forth.  It is unlikely that this idea will gain any traction, but on the flip side, licensing and disclosures for Internet content publication may not be so ludicrous.  With copyright violations, politicians griping about the accuracy of news, and regulations concerning what can and cannot be said with respect to medical or health related products online, public accountability is not a far fetched idea.  Take, for instance, Canada’s proposed Internet regulations (to be heard in February 2009) which would address Canadian copyright issues and might impose a rating system on websites that is similar to movie rating systems.  Given the opinion of many Americans that the Internet should be regulated in the same way that radio and television is regulated, the logical conclusion is that Internet publishers will need to register with whatever agency is created to administer online media.

Conclusion.

The foregoing paragraphs are just a glimpse at what has been going on and what future trends may be.  In view of the growing desire of people to see more Internet regulation instead of self responsibility, it is likely that we as Internet publishers will see an increasing amount of regulatory proposals.

There is something that web publishers can do right now to protect themselves, and that is to include a legally sound privacy policy statement on their websites.    Learn how to write a good privacy statement and policies page at the Not Guru blog.

Internet regulation and trends are periodically discussed here:  Internet Regulation articles at the NotGuru blog.