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By Kaylee Pearlman
WASHINGTON, DC – The ACLU this past week heavily criticized tech legislation in Congress – the “Earn It Act,” the “Stop CSAM Act” and the “Cooper Davis Act,” charging the measures would “invite constant government surveillance and significantly jeopardize Americans’ rights to free speech and digital privacy.”
The ACLU sent a letter to Congress Thursday that, “lays out the unacceptable consequences for free speech, privacy, and security this package of legislation would wreak havoc on the ways we connect, communicate, and organize.”
The ACLU adds, “these bills would push tech companies to over-censor their users and to jettison their own security tools in order to reduce their exposure to any legal liability…the bills could also result in the over-targeting of marginalized communities online.”
“These bills purport to hold powerful companies accountable for their failure to protect children and other vulnerable communities from dangers on their services…In reality, increasing censorship and weakening encryption would not only be ineffective at solving these concerns, it would in fact exacerbate them,” said Cody Venzke, senior policy counsel at ACLU
The ACLU warns “these bills will essentially force platforms to stop offering private, secure communications tools…if these bills are passed, platforms could be liable for user content they are unaware of, meaning they will increase efforts to monitor and surveil even legal speech.”
The ACLU argues the measures would “weaken the protections afforded by Section 230, which prevents online platforms from being held legally liable for content posted by third parties. By dismantling Section 230’s protections, these bills would incentivize platforms to over-censor user-generated content.”
The ACLU concludes, “these platforms may be forced to stop allowing user-generated content entirely…these effects would significantly impact the public’s ability to speak, learn, and engage with others online, and compromise the internet as we know it.”
