The Child Online Protection Act aimed to protect children from harmful online material, but was declared unconstitutional in 2009. It required businesses with adult content to collect personal identification to verify age, but had exceptions for educational material. Parents are responsible for their children’s online safety, but the government has a role in preventing access to harmful material. The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, which restricts the use of personal information of children under 13, is still in effect.
The Child Online Protection Act, abbreviated COPA, was passed in the United States in 1998 and attempted to protect children, also referred to as minors, from encountering harmful material while browsing online. The act considered any nudity or sexual content to be harmful material and was created to prevent children from accessing pornography and related sites. The law established that anyone who sells or distributes any material considered harmful to minors must prohibit minors from accessing their website. The Child Online Protection Act was declared unconstitutional due to its violation of the right to free speech and has not been enforced or upheld in court since 2009.
COPA should not be confused with COPPA, the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. This law was passed in 1998 and as of 2010 is still in effect in the United States. Restrict what an online person or business can do with personal information collected from people under the age of 13.
Under the Child Online Protection Act, a business or individual operating a website with adult content would have to ask visitors to enter a form of personal identification to access the site. It could be an identification number, credit card number or access code. Any information collected for the purpose of identifying someone as an adult and not a minor was considered private and it was illegal for the company to distribute or use this information in any way other than identification.
An exception to the harmful material rule was material that was considered educational or used for scientific purposes. Pictures or illustrations of the human body used for the purpose of teaching children about human anatomy and the workings of the body are examples of the exceptions. They would not be considered harmful or illegal under the Child Online Protection Act.
According to the Child Online Protection Act, parents are responsible for the care of their children, but the Internet makes it more difficult for parents to protect a child from sexual content. Therefore, the responsibility falls to the government to ensure that children do not access harmful material online. Although the Child Online Protection Act requires distributors to verify a person’s identity and age, those not directly responsible for distributing the material are not held liable. This protects Internet service providers and website hosting companies from being charged if one of their customers distributes harmful material to a minor.
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