The Legislation That Could Kill Internet Privacy for Good

08-19-2011 • The Atlantic

An overzealous bill that claims to be about stopping child pornography turns every Web user into a person to monitor Every right-thinking person abhors child pornography. To combat it, legislators have brought through committee a poorly conceived, over-broad Congressional bill, The Protecting Children from Internet Pornographers Act of 2011. It is arguably the biggest threat to civil liberties now under consideration in the United States. The potential victims: everyone who uses the Internet. The good news? It hasn't gone before the full House yet. The bad news: it already made it through committee. And history shows that in times of moral panic, overly broad legislation has a way of becoming law. In fact, a particular moment comes to mind.