Democrats and Republicans Targeting Section 230 (KOSA / SCREEN IT bills pass Senate Subcommittee)
The ongoing genocide in Palestine, the encroaching threat on Venezuela, and the reentry of TikTok back in conservative political discourse again mean the US govt is ramping up its efforts to censor political speech, news, and spy on citizens online.
Democrats and Republicans are now actively targeting Section 230 - a law that protects websites from constant legal harassment from political projects that would see them shut down, and prevents public speech from being silenced by way of holding websites liable in the same fashion as a publishing house (IIRC). Repealing Section 230 will ultimately put a giant muzzle on the internet.
The Senate subcommittee passed almost every anti-privacy law and digital surveillance bill that people publicly objected to (KOSA, SCREEN IT) and is trying to fast track it through Congress (during the weekend, two weeks before the start of the Holiday Break/Period).
This is around the same time that the EU is also trying to fast track its Digital ID gambit: Australia banned children from social media (and is designing age-gates for search engines), and Denmark is moving to do the same thing.
The West can't PR their way out of protecting genocidaires, sexual abusers, and accurate information countering their narratives. So now they're just flipping the board.
"Sen. WHITEHOUSE: We finally are moving to file a bipartisan Section 230 repeal bill. Waiting any longer serves no useful purpose." "Readers added context to this video: Section 230 protects online platforms from being considered publishers. This protects them from constant lawsuits over user content, allowing user content to flourish. Repealing it would force platforms to aggressively censor users to avoid liability, devastating the Internet. What Is Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act?" [x]
If you want an example of how the public has no real representation in the United States, remember the number of times KOSA and surveillance proposals and bills were halted, and they continued to push them over and over again despite public outcry.
Visit Bad Internet Bills to contact said representatives and agitate them. More voices speaking out against this is a must.
All of the bad internet bills. One website.
"UPDATE KOSA and all age verification bills passed the subcommittee. They are now heading to the full committee. If you were not loud before, it's time to get loud now. There is still a week left in the House. There's a chance they rush these bills through it Call 202-224-3121!" (x)
Related:
Why Isn’t Online Age Verification Just Like Showing Your ID In Person?
House Lawmakers Unite in Moral Panic, Advancing 18 “Kids’ Online Safety” Bills That Expand Surveillance and Weaken Privacy
EU and Canada agree to collaborate on digital ID mutual recognition, pilots
Stop Digital ID Checks
Celebrities will be instrumental in the current government gambit to attack Section 230. Currently, Joseph Gordon-Levitt (a zionist) is advocating for the dissolution of the law. Government and big tech are actively colluding with each other to censor certain speech (liberation ideology, communism, socialism, decentralized tech information, abolition ideology, etc) and proliferate others (evangelical, zionist, white supremacist, antiblack, etc), but the US government would have you believe they're ideologically opposed the corporations funding them and protecting them. They are bedfellows.
Gordon-Leavitt on Section 230 sunset bill: ‘I want to see this thing pass 100 to zero’
Actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt visited Capitol Hill Wednesday to advocate for a bill sunsetting Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a controversial provision that protects companies from facing lawsuits over third-party content from users on their platforms. “This is truly a bipartisan group of people, and it’s really representing the will of the American people. Despite the tech industry spending all kinds of money hiring lobbyists, trying to kill this thing, we are here,” Gordon-Leavitt said during a press conference alongside online safety advocates and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). “So I want to thank Senator Durbin, Senator [Lindsey] Graham [(R-S.C.)] for cosponsoring this bill. And I have a message for all the other senators out there: I want to see this thing pass 100 to zero. There should be nobody voting to give any more impunity to these tech companies, nobody. It’s time for a change; let’s make it happen.”
From Taylor Lorenz:
"Joseph Gordon-Levitt went to the Senate claiming to "hold big tech accountable" while promoting The Heritage Foundation's tech policy agenda and boosting groups like Morality in Media (aka NCOSE), which has sought to criminalize LGBTQ sex, w board members that support conversion therapy."
In the meantime, the number of "kid safety online" bills introduced across the US has only increased from the Kids Off Social Media Act, Idaho H542, Protecting Washington children online.
Related:
Discord will require a face scan or ID for full access next month
"We'll find other ways to bring users back" - Discord faces backlash over age checks after data breach exposed 70,000 IDs
They Are Trying To Kill The Internet - Taylor Lorenz
The UK Is Officially A Dystopia, And We're Next - Taylor Lorenz and The Kavernacle
As status quo systems make it more and more clear that they plan to silo and monitor you to death whilst selling your data, I really hope folks - however long it takes - are building or moving toward parallel systems outside of corpo purview.
