Testing the Boundaries

The demise of the Communications Decency Act last week ended, at least for now, the U.S. government’s attempt to regulate the Internet. But overseas, the debate over what role government should play in controlling cyberspace is just beginning.

Representatives from hundreds of countries will be wrestling with these issues at upcoming meetings in Europe, including one this week in Paris sponsored by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

There is some common ground. Most countries agree that such fundamentally repugnant things as child pornography, fraud and trafficking in human beings are just as illegal in cyberspace as they are in any other setting and are subject to the same punishment.

But beyond those basics, there may never be complete agreement among nations about what should and should not be accessible on the Internet--which, in light of the global, borderless nature of the medium, will undoubtedly create some quandaries. After grappling with the issue, the European Parliament recently acknowledged that even among its own members, consensus was an unattainable goal.

“What is considered to be harmful [on the Net] depends on cultural differences,” the Parliament said in a recent communication to members. “Each country may reach its own conclusion in defining the borderline between what is permissible and not permissible.”

In fact, that is already happening in fits and starts around the world. Here are a few prominent examples:

The Chinese government claims to recognize the strategic importance of the Internet, but officials have also made it clear that they intend to manage it and limit access to its information, just as they do with print and broadcast media.

Regulation started in February 1996, when the government required Internet service providers to use only government-provided phone lines and to register with the police. Now users must also register with police, and sign a pledge not to “harm” China’s national interests.

Currently, all traffic is routed through two major gateways in Beijing and Shanghai. Firewalls block access to specific Internet addresses, including many overseas newspapers and sites related to human rights, Taiwan and Tibetan politics.

The firewalls are easily defeated by knowledgeable surfers, and access to pornography, while technically illegal, is not actually blocked. Sometimes, foreign-news Web sites are blocked only during specific times, such as the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protest.

China’s police apparatus actively patrols cyberspace, keeps track of Chinese surfers and even puts out the country’s best-known anti-virus software, unflinchingly called “Kill.”

Beijing, the capital of China’s cyberspace community, currently has about 20 different Internet service providers, offering everything from e-mail to home page creation and corporate intranets.

At present, the lack of Chinese-language material on the Web and slow access discourage some potential surfers. But returning foreign students are boosting the Internet’s popularity. Experts say as many as 150,000 Chinese use the Internet, and the number is expected to multiply 10 times by the year 2000.

Other than China, perhaps no country is as unapologetically aggressive about regulating the Net as Singapore, an island nation that is rushing to become a technology hub even while strictly controlling its citizens’ access to cyberspace.

Internet providers are controlled by the Singapore Broadcasting Authority and must abide by the agency’s strict guidelines regarding “objectionable” content. By the SBA’s definition, that ranges from pornography to “areas which may undermine public morals, political stability or religious harmony.”

Schools, libraries and even cybercafes are required to install filtering software. Web pages dealing with politics and religion must not only be registered with the SBA, but must be operated by “persons of standing,” according to a document supplied by the Singaporean Embassy in Washington.

Government officials acknowledge that the Net is too amorphous to rein in completely, but that hasn’t kept them from trying. Last year, a Singaporean was fined the equivalent of $44,000 for possession of pornography downloaded from the Internet and a copy of banned Penthouse magazine.

In France, there are no new laws regulating the Internet, but one important legal benchmark may be established beginning July 9, when a Paris court will hear a case filed against an iconoclastic Web site author, Jean-Louis Costes, a singer, poet and artist whose provocative works include the CDs “Jap Jew” and “Hand the White Women Over to the Arabs.”

A Jewish student group, accusing Costes of fanning violence and racial hatred, are demanding the access provider be held legally responsible.

No French court has ever ordered an Internet provider to cut a service or suppress a page, or held the provider accountable for content available via his service. The Costes case may set the precedent.

French laws forbid the use of the Internet, like other media, from being the conduit for racist propaganda, sexual exploitation of children or claims that the murder of 6 million Jews by the Nazis never took place.

The French were also pioneers in banning encrypted communications, including via the Internet, since passing legislation in 1990.

“Even before Iraq or China or similar places, France was the first country to prevent people from hiding their communications,” said Jerome Thorel, editor of the monthly magazine Planete Internet. “Only the military has the right to do that.”

For the last six months in France, there has been a bid to create a system of self-regulation with a “council of wise men” that would represent Internet users’ associations, business interests and access providers.

One final, and very French, note: It is illegal in France for a Web site to advertise, offer or describe a service or product solely in English. The text must be posted in French as well.

In England, Internet regulation is still a legal gray area, aside from a 1990 law aimed principally at hackers and fraudsters trying to access government and bank information.

Peter Sommer, a research fellow in the London School of Economics’ Computer Security Research Center, said English authorities are all too conscious of the problems of regulating a global medium.

“It is one thing to pass a law, another to enforce it,” Sommer said. “The main problems facing regulation are territorial--how to establish laws for illegal computer traffic--whether pornography or fraud--whose provenance is often in some other country.”

In Japan, there are no laws regulating speech on the Internet. However, a nonprofit organization called the Electronic Network Consortium--which includes many computer companies--recently came up with guidelines that address in general terms the issues of inappropriate material on the Net. These fall under the rubrics “guidelines for the moral issues in the electronic network industry” and “rules and manners for those who utilize PC communication services.”

Meanwhile, the consortium is working to develop Internet filtering software modeled on products such as CyberPatrol and SurfWatch that are available in the United States.

“You can purchase [those products] in Japan,” said Shunshi Ota, a spokesman for the consortium. “But it doesn’t work for words written in Japanese.”

Russia and other former Soviet governments have so far either supported the Internet’s development or remained benignly indifferent. But suspicions remain that the region’s more authoritarian governments will try to rein in the medium.

Such fears were highlighted in a recent hoax about a forthcoming crackdown.

According to the Prague analytical journal Transition, a scandal broke out last year in Belarus over a note supposedly circulated among Internet groups. The note warned that Internet users would soon have to register with the police and that those who failed to do so would be punished.

The note was later exposed as a joke, “but the fact that huge numbers of informed people took such an item seriously suggests that Internet users in the region remain in an insecure position,” the journal said.

In Russia, too, there are signs that government is nervous. The potential reach of an April 1995 decree by President Boris Yeltsin on data encryption is seen as cause for alarm. Although not implemented, the decree theoretically forbids even the most elementary forms of encoding without special licensing. It also empowers a sub-agency of the Federal Security Service to regulate encryption issues.

But “despite all the spooks, idiots and hopeless roads,” Transition concludes, “the Internet in Russia is a chaotic, dynamic and growing phenomenon, as it is elsewhere in the world.”

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Testing the Boundaries

United States

A new law that would have imposed sweeping restrictions on “indecent” communications on the Internet was struck down by the Supreme Court. New legislation may emerge. A Clinton administration report that is expected this week will advocate minimal regulation of the medium.

Germany

Laws prohibiting Nazi propaganda and child pornography have been used aggressively in an effort to keep the Net “clean.” The head of Germany’s CompuServe subsidiary has been indicted, and a political activist goes on trial today for a Web page link to an illegal site.

Japan

There are no new laws regulating the Internet. An industry group, in conjunction with the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, recently issued guidelines identifying sensitive issues and is working to develop filtering software.

France

There are no new laws restricting Internet speech, but a trial in July will determine whether access providers can be held liable for illegal hate speech. Use of encryption technology requires police permits--an outrageous restriction in the eyes of many Netizens.

China

The most Draconian of all Internet regulators. All Internet users must register with the police. Access to many sites--including those of foreign newspapers--is routinely blocked. Accessing pornography is illegal. Police activly patrol cyberspace and keep track of surfers’ activities.

Singapore

Aggressively regulates the Net. A powerful agency requires access providers to restrict everything from pornography to “areas which may undermine political stability.” One citizen was fined the equivalent of $44,000 last year for possession of pornography downloaded from the Net.

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This report was prepared by Times staff writers Greg Miller in San Francisco, John-Thor Dahlburg in Paris, Vanora Bennett in Moscow, and David Holley in Tokyo. Times researchers Janet Stobart in London, Anthony Kuhn in Beijing and Etsuko Kawase in Tokyo also contributed.