Section 230 Authors Defend Online Free Speech Law In New Op-Ed

LOS ANGELES—With both Democrats and Republicans pushing to repeal or revise the 24-year-old law known as the “First Amendment of the Internet,” and after Donald Trump vetoed a crucial, unrelated defense spending bill because it did not include a clause ending the law, the authors of Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act felt compelled to defend their work.  Oregon Democratic Senator Ron Wyden (above, right), and former California Republican congressional rep Chris Cox (above, left) co-authored Section 230 nearly a quarter-century ago. Last week, they jointly published an op-ed column in the USA Today newspaper, defending Section 230, saying that repealing the law would lead to “chaos.” As AVN has reported, the possible repeal of Section 230 poses a specific threat to the adult industry online — as well as to free expression on the internet generally.  Section 230 protects free expression by exempting online platforms from legal liability over content published by users. That way, sites are free to allow a broad range of views to see the light of day, free from worry that they could be sued or prosecuted. That freedom has especially benefited the adult industry. “Efforts to roll back Section 230 protection will have a significant adverse impact on the adult entertainment industry if passed. Section 230 has been called the First Amendment of the internet for good reason,” First Amendment attorney Lawrence Walters told AVN in August. “Any change to Section 230 could result in restrictive content moderation rules or elimination of the platforms, themselves.” Though not specifically addressing the adult industry, Wyden and Cox make similar points in their op-ed article.  “If platforms are made responsible for everything millions of users post on their sites, they will have to read it all first. This would mark the end of the internet as a forum for real time communication,” the Section 230 authors wrote.  “It would also force every website hosting user content to create round-the-clock legal and editorial review teams staffed with hundreds or thousands of people to continually monitor every message, video, photo, and blog. Alternatively, websites would face exorbitant legal damages at every turn. That is not realistic.” Instead, Cox and Wyden write, “the many online avenues that ordinary citizens currently use to express themselves would be closed.” Hosting user-created content would simply become too dangerous and expensive to manage for even the largest, most powerful platforms. “It is difficult to imagine a scenario more chilling of individual speech and the public's right to know,” Cox and Wyden conclude. The Section 230 authors wrote that they would be open to new legislation to fine-tune the law and bring it up-to-date with conditions of the modern internet, but Congress should be careful to guarantee that it makes any changes to the law, it must do so “without doing more harm than good.” Photos By United States Congress / Wikimedia Commons Public Domain