TW: Mentions of Sexual Abuse
In early February a highly controversial bill was reintroduced into both the House of Commons as well as the Senate in the USA. The EARN IT act also known as the Eliminating Abuse and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies act aims to place responsibility on social media sites for the media it hosts. This act was created in response to the unfortunate rise in child sexual abuse material online. The act garnered bipartisan support in 2020 when it was first introduced but was pushed aside with the rise of the COVID-19 pandemic. Along with support, came disdain from multiple civil liberties groups as well as many security experts.
If the EARN IT act were to pass it would remove the immunity currently allowed for online platforms from civil liability in regards to child exploitation. The current legislation that this bill would amend is Section 230 of the Communications Act. Under this act blanket immunity is given to social media sites protecting them from civil lawsuits. The supporters of the EARN IT act argue that as a result of the immunity there is no incentive for social media companies to take down and limit abusive posts. Without the blanket immunity, large social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter would be in danger of being sued for any exploitative posts that they host. In addition to the removal of the immunity a National Commission on Online Child Exploitation Prevention would be established to create guidelines for social media sites to prevent and remove exploitative posts.
The main criticism against the act is that it would encourage social media companies to decrease the amount of encryption and security on their sites. In order to ensure that no harmful media or messages are being sent or posted, social media companies would need to decrease encryption in their messaging services. Advocacy groups have argued that those in vulnerable communities such as the LGBTQ+ community rely heavily on encrypted messaging systems to access resources and support networks. Removing or decreasing the encryption would put these individuals in danger. On the other hand, the act would also increase the amount of censorship on social media sites which have already been criticized for silencing vulnerable voices. There have also been remarks on increasing prosecution efforts and punishments for those that choose to engage in abusive child focused media instead of attempting to pass acts such as the EARN IT act.
In my opinion, I agree with those that are looking for increased prosecution and investigative efforts towards those who post and interact with sexually exploitative media. In regards to the EARN IT act, I think that the USA should implement a similar style of act where social media companies need to proactively remove and prevent any type of exploitative content regardless of age. If they do not comply they would be at risk of prosecution as well as civil lawsuits. This act would also come with assurances that encryption and security measures would not be sacrificed in order to comply with the new legislation. This opinion is a best of both worlds option which may not be realistically feasible or possible but one can always hope.
References Used
- https://www.nextgov.com/policy/2022/02/earn-it-act-reintroduced-draws-criticism-over-encryption-implications/361437/
- https://www.nexttv.com/news/computer-companies-slam-earn-it-act
- https://www.protocol.com/bulletins/earn-it-act-back
- https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2022/02/the-earn-it-act-is-back.html
Censorship before encrypting and transferring the message to social media companies server could be an idea to look into. But this is a great post and got me thinking into the issue.
A good post! Judging from the pros and cons outlined by both sides, there appears that there will be winners and losers regardless. Since the Act concerns civil liberty groups and security experts, perhaps diminishing how secure our information maybe could serve as a possible open door for malicious groups to exploit. It seems that these social media companies will have to do more on their part as well to monitor traffic and identify malicious activity. This is what I imagine when the concern of encryption comes up.
But this does appear to be just a ‘worst-case scenario’ concern, and may just be that. But given the Act’s focused intent to address online child abuse, the Act may do more good than harm.
Super interesting issue! I absolutely agree with you that social media platforms need to have some accountability in what is on their site – especially when it harms children. While the current situation calls for a cost-benefit analysis of online security vs. the protection of rights, I think that as technologies evolve and platforms change their way of operation and encryption – this choice may not have to exist in the future.
This topic has been on the steady rise and would like to thank you for making a post about it. The EARN IT act I believe was pioneered by Apple as they have actually implemented such anti child abuse policies and technologies into their own photos app! I agree with the main concern of less encryption and security is a big deal, a handful current Apple photos users see this act as a breach of Privacy as well so this raises the question I must ask the public too, with the rise of online social media information privacy, does allowing an act like EARN IT justify a user to give up on the privacy of their own content or is it another method for governments to use anti-abuse to gather more data?
This is an interesting post! Now a days since all of us are on social media we tend to see a lot of stuff happening on there and sometimes people post abusive comments under someone’s post and it ruins their image online. we all know about the app tiktok and how it has emerged in the past few years there has been numerous posts, news and articles about all the creators in that app and they get cancelled for any past actions they have committed in the past and their so called “fans” would send them threats and the worst part is that the social media people wouldn’t prevent that spread hatred throughout the internet and allow people to post whatever they want and this should stop.
To see this bill back in congress is indeed alarming. Weakening encryption does quite the opposite of protecting children online, not to mention endangering minorities facing discrimination such as the LGBT community mentioned in this post. Shifting the responsibility of monitoring online content from the social media platforms themselves to lawmakers disincentivizes providers from continuing their voluntary detection efforts beyond the bare minimum of what is required by the bill. The senators supporting the EARN IT act are not security experts, and some may simply not understand exactly what this bill would entail.
Informative post! I have not heard of the EARN IT act before, and you did a great job of explaining what it entails and the controversy surrounding it. To me, the EARN IT act seems like a double edged sword- on one side, companies can be held more accountable for hosting exploitative content, and hopefully such content will be decreased/removed overall, but on the other side, companies will lower security and possibly introduce vulnerabilities in their systems. Based on some research I did on this subject, it seems that this act would make companies essentially hand over “backdoor” access to encrypted messages which I find extremely concerning. Personally, I think that the negatives of this act far outweigh the benefits. While some exploitation may be reduced, I feel that abusers will only move off the platform onto more private ones, such as within the dark web. In return, governments can gain essentially full access to private and personal information of users. However, while I do disagree with this act overall, I still agree with its main intention- the implementation of interventions to prevent child exploitation. Perhaps the EARN IT act could be modified to push social media companies to do more to flag and remove harmful content, as well as increase punishments for distributors/interactors, rather than just decrease encryption and security.
Trading decreased encryption in order to monitor harmful content with potentially putting vulnerable groups at risk due to said decreased decryption is definitely a very tough issue. Trying to keep everyone protected should always be a top priority for any major tech company, but I wonder how many tradeoffs these companies always need to make to keep the interests and safety of all parties involved satisfied? I always ask myself “Isn’t there a another way?” when considering any tradeoffs. Man, yeah, this one is tough. Does it come down to what issue at hand takes priority? Regarding harmful content, I know TikTok has algorithms in place to help censor specific words and images, so I wonder if something like that could be implemented into other social media to automatically stop the spread of harmful content without sacrificing encryption?
Great job on this post! I had not heard of the EARN IT act before, and I really appreciate you bringing attention to it, as well as discussing both sides of the argument! Since we now live in a society where social media is so common and widespread, unfortunately, it provides so many avenues for child endangerment and exploitation online. I definitely agree that steps should be taken in government to try to ensure child protection online, but I can’t say I agree completely with the bill when the result will be a reduction of encryption and security that could harm many more vulnerable communities that rely on them. In addition, I have seen many censorship algorithms that exist today, such as TikTok’s, that in practice sometimes do more to harm minority groups than to protect children. I hope something similar to your best-of-both-worlds scenario is feasible in the future, and I will definitely look more into this issue!
Interesting read!
It seems that it has been historically hard to enforce laws digitally without impeding on user’s privacy and security. An example from the past would be when the US passed the patriot act that essentially allowed the US to make software that can spy on anybody (as shown by whistleblower Edward Snowden). On the surface level, it seems like it has mitigated any risks regarding terrorism but it is really just deep down an excuse for the US government to impede on people’s privacy.
This seems like another step in the debate of the roles of social media and their responsibilities regarding regulation. Many point out that private companies like Twitter or Facebook are not governing bodies, and so are not required to ensure users have freedom of speech on their platforms, but neglect to consider the inherent responsibilities that come with that. After all, if Facebook is taking on a responsibility to censor certain forms of speech or expression, it would seem reasonable that they have a responsibility to ensure discussion remains lawful. This is especially concerning when children are involved, as they can suffer the most from these unchecked actions. It seems to me that social media companies should either stop regulating speech at all, allowing governing bodies to take control using federal speech laws, or should take a more hands on role in preventing unlawful behavior.
This all being said, I’m not informed enough on the issue to comment on whether the EARN IT act is the appropriate solution. However, I can’t help but be sympathetic to the idea that if companies take on the responsibility of regulating speech on their platforms, they should be responsible for activities that occur on said platform. So long as people consent to these invasions of privacy and are properly informed beforehand so that they can avoid using social media messaging if they choose to, I struggle to see that the harm outweighs the benefits.
Hey, nice post. Nowadays when we are on social media, we see a lot of vulgar posts even when the post is about helping kids in hospital or fundraising ads. So, in my opinion the EARN IT act is kind of a double edge sword. On one hand, companies can be held more accountable for hosting exploitative content, and hopefully such content will be decreased/removed overall, but on the other side, companies will lower security and possibly introduce vulnerabilities in their systems. So, I really hope something similar to your best-of-both-worlds scenario will become reality.
Great Post, The dark web is the hidden collective of internet sites only accessible by a specialized web browser. It is used for keeping internet activity anonymous and private, which can be helpful in both legal and illegal applications. Thank you for providing references for learning in-depth.
Although the EARN IT act comes from good intentions, I wonder if it will actually be effective at solving the issue of removing content regarding child abuse. There’s obviously a market for content such as this and although the EARN IT act hopes to remove access to such content on mainstream sites, I feel that this will cause this content to be relocated to much shadier sites that are harder to regulate. Ergo, hiding the problem instead of actually solving it to an extent. However, I hope I’m wrong in my hypothesis. An interesting read.
I wonder if what you suggest is truly realistic. In many situations it takes personal review of content by an actual physical person to confirm if something is worth being taken down (such as with Youtube’s content review services, which are notorious for auto-removing things that should not be). Faced with the cost of those measures, many websites would likely just stop operating, figuring that it is no longer worth the cost of doing business, and resulting in a chilling effect on website operation, and arguably development.