On July 27th, The Progress & Freedom Foundation hosted a Capitol Hill panel discussion entitled “Online Child Safety, Privacy, and Free Speech: An Overview of Challenges in Congress & the States.” The event featured remarks from:

• Parry Aftab, Executive Director, WiredSafety.org
• Todd Haiken, Senior Manager of Policy, Common Sense Media
• Jim Halpert, Partner, DLA Piper
• Berin Szoka, Senior Fellow, The Progress & Freedom Foundation

We’ve just released the transcript of the event, which I have also pasted down below the fold in a Scribd document reader. Also, the audio for this event can be heard by clicking below:

Download mp3

Here is the full event description:

Online child safety, privacy, and free speech remain hotly debated issues at both the federal and state level. Bills introduced in Congress to address cyberbullying concerns propose either educational initiatives or a criminalization approach. Access to objectionable content also remains a concern and a new, government-mandated task force is looking into those issues. Meanwhile, state officials, including many state attorneys general, continue to explore age verification mandates for social networking sites and some have considered building on the federal Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) to expand “parental notification” mandates. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has recently announced an expedited review of COPPA to see if it is keeping up with new developments. The FTC is also exploring child safety in virtual worlds. New concerns about “sexting,” or the sending of sexual explicit images over mobile devices, has also raised new concerns led some lawmakers to ponder penalties.

How serious are these concerns? Is legislation or regulation needed to address them? What free speech issues are at stake? Should Congress take the lead or leave it to the States to experiment with different models? These and other issues were discussed by a panel of leading experts in the field of online safety and privacy policy.

Transcript PFF Online Child Safety Privacy Hill Event (7-27-2009) http://d.scribd.com/ScribdViewer.swf?document_id=18756666&access_key=key-1blb7az1ag406howibuk&page=1&version=1&viewMode=

Just a heads up for those of you in the DC-area… On Monday, July 27th, PFF will be hosting a Hill event on “Online Child Safety, Privacy, and Free Speech: An Overview of Challenges in Congress & the States.” I will be moderating the discussion and we will be joined by Parry Aftab, Executive Director of WiredSafety.org, Jim Halpert a Partner with the law firm of DLA Piper, Todd Haiken, Senior Manager of Policy for Common Sense Media, and my colleague Berin Szoka also of PFF.

The event will focus on the intersection of online child safety, privacy, and free speech issues at both the federal and state level. Bills introduced in Congress to address cyberbullying concerns propose either educational initiatives or a criminalization approach. Access to objectionable content also remains a concern and a new, government-mandated task force is looking into those issues. Meanwhile, state officials, including many state attorneys general, continue to explore age verification mandates for social networking sites and some have considered building on the federal Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) to expand “parental notification” mandates. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has recently announced an expedited review of COPPA to see if it is keeping up with new developments. The FTC is also exploring child safety in virtual worlds. New concerns about “sexting,” or the sending of sexual explicit images over mobile devices, has also raised new concerns led some lawmakers to ponder penalties.

How serious are these concerns? Is legislation or regulation needed to address them? What free speech issues are at stake? Should Congress take the lead or leave it to the States to experiment with different models? These and other issues will be discussed by the panelists at our July 27th event.

The logistical details are below and you RSVP here.

“Online Child Safety, Privacy, and Free Speech: An Overview of Challenges in Congress & the States” July 27, 2009 12:00 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. Room SVC-208 Capitol Visitor Center 1st Street and East Capitol Street, NE (entrance across from Supreme Court)

Today, the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced the members of the new Online Safety and Technology Working Group (OSTWG).  I am honored to be among those chosen to participate in this new task force and I look forward to continuing the work started last year with the Harvard Berkman Center’s Internet Safety Technical Task Force (ISTTF), which I also served on.   I was very proud of the work done by the ISTTF and the impressive final report that Prof. John Palfrey crafted to reflect our findings.  I am eager to investigate these issues further and take a look at the latest research and technologies that can help us better understand how to protect our kids online while also protecting the free speech and privacy rights of Netizens.

The new NTIA working group, which was established under the “Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act,” will report to the Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information on industry-implemented online child safety tools and efforts. Within a year of convening its first meeting, the group will submit a report of its findings and make recommendations on how to increase online safety measures.

Below the fold I have listed the complete roster of OSTWG task force members.  I very much looking forward to working with this outstanding group.  And I’m happy to report that my TLF blogging colleague Braden Cox will be joining me on this task force!

Ms. Parry Aftab, WiredSafety Ms. Elizabeth Banker, Yahoo! Inc. Mr. Christopher Bubb, AOL Ms. Anne Collier, Net Family News, Inc./ConnectSafely.org Mr. Braden Cox, NetChoice Coalition Ms. Caroline Curtin, Microsoft Mr. Brian Cute, Afilias U.S.A. Mr. Jeremy Geigle, Arizona Family Council Ms. Marsali Hancock, Internet Keep Safe Coalition Mr. Michael Kaiser, National Cyber Security Alliance Mr. Christopher Kelly, Facebook Mr. Brian Knapp, Loopt, Inc. Mr. Timothy Lordan, Internet Education Foundation Mr. Larry Magid, SafeKids.com/ConnectSafely.org Mr. Brian Markwalter, Consumer Electronics Association Mr. Michael McKeehan, Verizon Communications, Inc. Dr. Samuel McQuade, III, Rochester Institute of Technology Ms. Orit Michiel, Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. Mr. John Morris, Center for Democracy & Technology Mr. Jonathon Nevett, Network Solutions, LLC Mr. Hemanshu Nigam, MySpace/Fox Interactive Media Ms. Jill Nissen, Ning, Inc. Mr. Jay Opperman, Comcast Corporation Mr. Kevin Rupy, United States Telecom Association Mr. John Shehan, National Center for Missing & Exploited Children Mr. K. Dane Snowden, CTIA – the Wireless Association Mr. Adam Thierer, Progress & Freedom Foundation Ms. Patricia Vance, Entertainment Software Rating Board Mr. Ralph Yarro, The CP80 Foundation

• denotes co-chairs of the task force