Once agai, Congress has shown how clueless it is when it comes to the Internet. Here a quote from a News.com article:
The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday overwhelmingly approved a bill saying that anyone offering an open Wi-Fi connection to the public must report illegal images including “obscene” cartoons and drawings–or face fines of up to $300,000.
That broad definition would cover individuals, coffee shops, libraries, hotels, and even some government agencies that provide Wi-Fi. It also sweeps in social-networking sites, domain name registrars, Internet service providers, and e-mail service providers such as Hotmail and Gmail, and it may require that the complete contents of the user’s account be retained for subsequent police inspection.
Such a bill, if signed in to law, would cripple the Internet. Gee, I guess then would wouldn’t have to worry about falling so far behind the rest of the world in broadband development. but at least the children will be “safe”…
>>By the way, what was their definition of obscene?
Probably something intentionally vague 🙂
Wow! That is staggeringly idiotic.
It’s good that it’ll only affect coffee shops and hotels that offer Wi-Fi. Gee, think of what that the Congress could do to web hosting services.
By the way, what was their definition of obscene?