LEVEL 1 - 85 OF 119 STORIES Copyright 1995 American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. All rights reserved ABC NEWS SHOW: Nightline (ABC 11:30 pm ET) June 27, 1995 Transcript # 3677 TYPE: Show; Interview SECTION: News; Domestic LENGTH: 3880 words BODY: ANNOUNCER: June 27th, 1995. MARTY RIMM: Necrophilia, for those who are interested in sex with the dead. TED KOPPEL: [voice-over] It's the kind of smut many of the porn stores won't Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 even carry. MARTY RIMM: Pedophilia, bestiality, vaginal and rectal fisting, sadomasochism. TED KOPPEL: [voice-over] Now, it's the kind of material you and your kids can see with just the click of a button. NANCY TAMOSAITIS, Author, 'The Joy of Cybersex': He's logging on and showing Mom and Dad things, and Mom and Dad suddenly see an image of a naked woman and freak out. H. DEEN KAPLAN, Family Welfare Advocate: Porn stars, pictures devoted to nothing but sexual pictures of pregnant women. This is something that almost any computer-literate eight-, nine- or 10-year-old can do. TED KOPPEL: [voice-over] Tonight, cybersex: policing pornography on the Internet. ANNOUNCER: This is ABC News Nightline. Reporting from Washington, Ted Koppel. TED KOPPEL: There is, surely, nothing new about pornography, nor is there anything new about most parents wanting to keep pornography out of the hands Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 of their young children. But as long as the distribution of pornography was limited to photographs, magazines, films or books, adults could entertain the illusion that it was still possible to limit a child's access. Videocassettes and cable television complicated the task, but now along comes Internet, which seems to have made it all but impossible. You can lock up pictures and books, you can exercise some sort of control over access to theaters and, to a lesser degree, even video stores. Cable television represents a major problem, but cyberspace may present an insoluble one. There is available on the Internet every kind of pornography you've ever envisioned, and many you've never thought of. You can't remove it, you can't eliminate it, and whatever a majority of the U.S. Senate may have been led to believe, you cannot legislate it out of existence. Here's an outline of the problem from Nightline correspondent Dave Marash. DAVE MARASH, ABC News: [voice-over] Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, a school on the cutting edge of science and technology, especially computer science and technology. ERWIN STEINBERG, Carnegie Mellon University: We were part of the original Internet. I think there were six or seven members that set up, in effect, what is this loop for passing information back and forth, originally for scientific Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 material. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] From the first, just 10 years ago, the Internet and Carnegie Mellon's campus network of computers and bulletin boards were dedicated to academic and intellectual freedom. ERWIN STEINBERG: There were absolutely no rules. It never occurred to us to set up rules. People could access whatever they wanted. As a matter of fact, we worked very hard to enable them to access anything on the Internet, or to send anything on the Internet that they felt was intellectually or educationally important. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] As to exactly what information students were accessing and communicating- ERWIN STEINBERG: We didn't know. We didn't look, we didn't ask, it wasn't any of our concern. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] Then, along came an ambitious undergraduate named Marty Rimm, and the first broad-scale research on who is marketing what in cyberspace. Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 MARTY RIMM: We are witnessing on the Internet the widespread and unprecedented proliferation of pornographic images which depict pedophilia, bestiality, vaginal and rectal fisting, sadomasochism, urination and defecation. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] Rimm's research turned up close to a million items of pornography on display in cyberspace, stuff so raw you couldn't get it at many neighborhood adult book and video stores, stuff that was once also hard to access by a computer. MARTY RIMM: One or two years ago, you had to be a hacker of sorts to be able to go through the Usenet and navigate and download, cut, paste, decode images in the UNIX platform. But today, with the Worldwide Web, it's as easy as the click of a button. DAVE MARASH: It's literally child's play? MARTY RIMM: Is it literally child's play? I think, within the next few years, within the next year or so, it will become child play. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] How easy? Deen Kaplan showed us on the computer in his Virginia office. Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 H. DEEN KAPLAN, Family Welfare Advocate: A child who is on the Internet, as we are now, would merely go and call up a little window, and if they wanted to search on the word sex in the Usenet news groups, and find some of those groups, at least, that have to deal with the topic of sex, they would put the word in and start searching. Then they could go through and the first thing that they would come up to is alt.binaries.pictures.groupsex, which is a group devoted specifically to distribution of photographs and images devoted to group sex. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] And that, of course, is not all. A couple more keystrokes and you get- H. DEEN KAPLAN: Children, bestiality, bondage. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] But a pornographer that Rimm studied found that his best way to guarantee big sales was to offer sex that tortured or humiliated women. PHILIP ELMER-DEWITT, 'Time' Magazine: He found that if he- if he- if he just described an act of oral sex, a photograph of oral sex, just straight oral sex, it wasn't a particularly popular picture. Not a lot of people chose to download it. But if, in his description, he included the word 'choke' or 'choking,' it would double the number of hits. Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] And the Carnegie study turned up even more disturbing data. MARTY RIMM: The demand for child pornography is way out of proportion to its availability or supply, so that those pornographers willing to risk violation of child pornography laws are reaping huge profits. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] And this child pornography, too, can be accessed by children. KAREN SHANOR, Clinical Psychologist: And we're talking about children of the technological age, who are better at computers than many adults are, so they have already a familiarity, sometimes even a friendship, if you will, with that computer. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] Imagine, says psychologist Shanor, the shock to a cybersurfer with a hacker's computer skills but a child's innocence when he or she accesses pictures of sex involving torture, animals or other children. KAREN SHANOR: I call it kind of a rape of the psyche for some children when they encounter something - excuse me - in terms of pornography, especially on the Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 screen, which may be so traumatic for them, this will really cut off their sexual development, and they'll be so repulsed or afraid that- that they won't want to be sexual. NANCY TAMOSAITIS, Author, 'The Joy of Cybersex': I was, initially, and still am, very fascinated by what people do online, and how they express their sexuality online. It's fascinating. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] Nancy Tamosaitis is the author of The Joy of Cybersex. She contends the computer can be a great way to meet people and sometimes find a relationship, if you're an adult. But if you're a child- NANCY TAMOSAITIS: Adults do prey on kids online. That is a valid fact. I have attempted to- I've gone online in character as a 15-year-old and I've witnessed that, so I think that can be a little frightening. You don't have to be a Lolita online. It will get- it will get- it can get pretty racy in live chat rooms, particularly ones that are geared towards sexual subjects. And we're in a room called 'Man Seeks Woman' now, so we shouldn't be surprised. DAVE MARASH: It's a terrifying prospect for parents, especially as technology makes ever greater the sexual reality in virtual reality, and ever easier your child's potential for accessing it. In the words of the Carnegie Mellon Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 scholar who's trying to set out cyberspace rules for his students- ERWIN STEINBERG: Well, if I can get professorial and quote Freud, he points out in one of his books that people, in order to be part of a society, must give up some of their freedom. The problem is how to maintain maximum freedom and still maintain a livable society. And we're hunting for that. That's not an easy solution. DAVE MARASH: [voice-over] Not for Carnegie, not for Congress, not for any of us. I'm Dave Marash for Nightline, in Washington. TED KOPPEL: It may not be easy, but it is something Congress is trying to tackle by making it illegal to transmit any pornography over a network accessible to minors. When we come back, we'll talk about the efforts to control pornography on the Internet with one man who supports the most far-reaching proposals, and with another who thinks some of the Internet policing goes too far. [Commercial break] TED KOPPEL: Joining us now from Virginia Beach, Virginia, Ralph Reed. He is executive director of the Christian Coalition. And joining us from our Washington bureau, Mike Godwin, counsel for the Electronic Frontier Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 Foundation. He advises electronic networks about their legal rights and responsibilities. Is there first of all, Mr. Godwin, any disagreement about whether some of this material needs to be kept out of the hands of children? MIKE GODWIN, Electronic Frontier Foundation: Well, you know, I'm a parent myself, and I'm concerned about my little girl who will grow up, be the first person in my family to grow up with the Internet, so I'm concerned about being able to make choices for my little girl about what kind of material is appropriate. TED KOPPEL: Can it be kept out of the hands of children? In other words, can you either legislate it or technically create a circumstance that makes it possible so that children can't get to it? MIKE GODWIN: I think it's important for people to recognize that computers are the most programmable, the most flexible technology we have on our desks, so it becomes relatively easy to come up with technical solutions that allow parents to make individualized choices about what their children see. TED KOPPEL: And if we try to generalize it, if we try to legislate some sort Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 of technical control, is that doable? MIKE GODWIN: Well, I think what we see now are proposals that, in effect, take the standard of what's appropriate that parents normally get to set, and send it to the FCC in Washington. And I think that the notion of having a federal bureaucrat in D.C. determine what's appropriate for parents is wholly unworkable and sort of repugnant to the idea of family values. TED KOPPEL: I'm not sure that, for the moment at least, that I care whether you think it's appropriate or inappropriate. I'm asking you, can it be done? MIKE GODWIN: I don't think it can be done, because the thing about the Internet is that it's not like a phone system, it's not like a phone sex service. It is distributed, it was designed to stop a nuclear attack, or rather, to survive a nuclear attack. If it can do that, it can certainly survive a U.S. attorney. TED KOPPEL: Pick up on that note, if you would, Mr. Reed. As you probably know, back in the 1960s, Internet was designed quite literally without a central hub, so that literally any computer on the Internet could, if it survived, physically survived, a nuclear attack, would be able to distribute and receive information to and from other computers. If you can do that with a nuclear attack, it seems to me that it ought to be able to withstand the U.S. Senate. Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 RALPH REED, Christian Coalition: Well, I- that's really not accurate, Ted. The fact of the matter is, is that there are passwords, there are code words, there are ways to trace the people who are putting this information on the Internet. In fact, one of the most notorious abusers is sitting in a state prison right now awaiting some of the most serious pornography charges that it is possible [sic]. Ted, we already have 6.8 million households online. According to the Carnegie Mellon survey, 35 percent of those have children in the home. So if you extrapolate this out to the end of this century, the early 25 years of the next century when the Internet has somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 to 70 million households online, you could literally be talking about 20 to 30 million children exposed to this information. And as your report pointed out, this is not Playboy Penthouse. This is bestiality, it's pedophilia, it's child molestation. According to the Carnegie Mellon survey, one-quarter of all the images involve the torture of women, so I think that this is a consensus that something has to be done about it, and if you're asking me do I think that U.S. attorneys and other federal law enforcement officials could use it effectively, the answer is an unequivocal yes. TED KOPPEL: Let me just point out to you, I'm not asking either one of you whether you think this material is good or bad. Let us, for the sake of this discussion, agree it's terrible. It's about as disgusting as material can be, Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 and as parents, every one of us would try to find some means to keep it from underage children. What I am asking is whether it is physically possible. You talked to me about a pornographer as though you were talking about a publisher, some guy who's sitting in a prison. What I'm tell you is, and you already know this, Mr. Reed, that the material which has been distributed may already be in 50,000 computers around the country, and any one of those computers can now be the distributor of that material. RALPH REED: Well, the reason for that, of course, is until this last week we didn't have the federal government taking any kind of systematic attempts to stamp it out. And what I'm saying is, Ted, the reason why I think this is such a serious problem is because, unlike the telephone, unlike television, you have a kind of cross-generational phenomenon here where you have pre-computer-literate parents supervising computer-literate children. And a child eight, nine, 10 years old is only two or three clicks away from that pornography. And that's why, by the way, this legislation that we support was supported by the Chamber of Commerce as well as by pro-family groups, Dianne Feinstein voted for it as well as Jesse Helms, and when you have Jesse Helms and Dianne Feinstein voting on the same side of an issue, that's called consensus. TED KOPPEL: No, what it's called is people who don't want to be on the wrong side of pornography, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it is practical or Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 that it is doable. Mr. Godwin, I'm asking you, as someone who has dealt with this presumably most of your adult life, is it physically doable? Can you keep it out of the hands of kids? MIKE GODWIN: Oh, I think you can keep it out of the hands of kids, but you can't do it by attempting to legislate it in Washington. The way you do it - and let me just say one thing here - we're not talking just about obscenity. We're talking about legislation that reaches far beyond that, and that's one of the reasons we're worried about that at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. But can you stop material? Yes, you can, but the way you do it is, you design tools that will let parents do it at their home computer. TED KOPPEL: Okay, let me- MIKE GODWIN: And the notion that parents are too dumb to learn computers, I think, is outrageous. TED KOPPEL: No, no, no, it's not outrageous. I'm living proof of it. Trust me. Every one of my kids knows more about computers than I do. But let's pick up on that point when we come back. We're going to take a short break, back in a moment. Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 [Concerned about children seeing pornography on the Internet? Yes, 85%; No, 13% (Source: Princeton Survey Research Associates. Should the government control sexual content on computer networks?: Yes, 42%; No, 48% (Source: 'Time'/CNN Poll] [Commercial break] TED KOPPEL: And we're back with Ralph Reed and Mike Godwin. Mr. Godwin, I truly was not exaggerating when I say that- that I, as an example, someone well over 50 who has not grown up with computers, will never be as computer-literate as any one of my children. Now, my children are all adults, but I think the point that Ralph Reed makes is an excellent one, and that is you have in hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of families around America parents who know less about computers than their children do, and you are suggesting that the parents are the ones who are supposed to be in control of the computer. MIKE GODWIN: Well, I think parents want to have that power. And one of the things that I'm very excited about is that the American software industry and the online service providers are working very hard to put tools in the hands of parents, and not complicated tools that require you to be a programmer or that Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 require you to have technical knowledge, but stuff that allows you to click boxes with your mouse that you don't have to think about, that don't take a lot of learning, and that allow you to even make customized choices. You know, the legislation that Ralph Reed is backing here would not prevent a child predator from coming online and saying to a child, 'Meet me at the corner of Third and Elm for an ice cream cone.' That's not indecent speech, that's not obscene speech. It's possible for predators to function no matter what. But if you had these tools in your hand, you could say, whenever anyone asks where do you live or what your age is, that screen, that communication is blocked, even when the parent is not around. RALPH REED: Ted- TED KOPPEL: Mr. Reed? RALPH REED: -well, Ted, I would just make the point that what's going on in the Internet right now isn't people getting on there saying 'Would you like to meet me at the corner of Third and Elm for an ice cream cone?' What's going on is they are sending out sexually explicit, disgusting, pornographic and vivid pictures and the reality is, most parents don't even know what the Internet is. They certainly don't know what the Worldwide Web is. Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 MIKE GODWIN: But Ralph, obscenity is already illegal, Ralph. RALPH REED: And when a child- we- if I could just finish my thought, we had a member of our organization in Michigan who called us just this week. She went out and figured, 'Well, my child needs to know Internet if they're going to be a full citizen in the 21st century. She popped it in, she went around the corner to run an errand, and when she got back, her child was looking at images of bestiality. Now, she doesn't know anything about this software, and a 10-year-old was able to click it in inside five minutes. We've got to protect that child and we've got to protect that woman. TED KOPPEL: We keep going around and around here. I don't question for a moment the sincerity or the goal here. Protection is clearly what we are after. The question is, whether protection can be legislated from Washington or whether, as Mr. Godwin is suggesting, protection is placed in the hands of each parent. And is it practical to say to each parent, 'Here it is, here's how you block out this material, now go ahead and do it.' RALPH REED: Ted, it's already regulated from Washington. The thing- MIKE GODWIN: You know, I could- Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 RALPH REED: -the things that were passed in the Coats-Exon Communications Decency Act simply applied to computers. The laws that are already on the books for telephones. The reason why this has to be done at the federal level, Ted, is very simple. It's interstate commerce, under the interstate commerce clause of the Constitution, these types of communications can't be regulated by states or municipalities. MIKE GODWIN: But you know, even without the passage of this legislation, there are already laws on the books that prohibit the distribution of obscenity, and there are laws in just about every state prohibiting the distribution of this material to minors. As a parent, you know, I take very cold comfort in the idea that if somebody sends inappropriate material to my child, then a year or two years down the line the U.S. attorney will prosecute the person and send them to jail. What I would rather do is have the power in my home computer to make- to prevent that from happening in the first place. TED KOPPEL: But I guess I'm asking you both about the practicality of these solutions. If material is being distributed to hundreds of thousands of homes, you don't have enough U.S. attorneys or local district attorneys to prosecute all the cases we're talking about, and the distribution does not go from one pornographer to 100,000 people. The distribution on that Internetwork [sic] Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 may come through 50,000 people exchanging information. Then what are you going to do? RALPH REED: But Ted, that's what's happening right now, because it's not against the law. The point is- MIKE GODWIN: It is against the law. RALPH REED: -is that the minute- the minute you say that it's against the law to provide access to it, the minute you create that legal injunction at the federal level, much of this distribution will cease. And furthermore, let me make an important point, and that is that we are not saying at all that having a federal law vitiates the responsibility of a parent to be involved in monitoring this activity. What we want to ensure is that the government is the friend rather than the foe of the parent in ensuring that cyberspace and the information highway is family and children-friendly. TED KOPPEL: We're down to our last few seconds. Mr. Godwin, you get the last word. MIKE GODWIN: Well, I think it's funny that Ralph Reed, of all people, is backing a big government solution to a problem. It's already the case that obscenity Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 distribution is illegal. The next step is not to pass this new law, which just duplicates old laws, it's to provide incentives that create the tools for parents who really want the power to make those choices for their children. TED KOPPEL: Go ahead, Ralph Reed, he raised your name, so you get to respond. RALPH REED: Well, I think the bottom line is this, Ted. It passed 86-14 in the Senate. It's on its way to the House. I think it's going to pass and I think Bill Clinton's going to sign it or he's going to get a big wake-up call in 1996. TED KOPPEL: Gentlemen, thank you both very much indeed, Ralph Reed and Mike Godwin. I'll be back in just a moment. [Commercial break] TED KOPPEL: Tomorrow, on Good Morning America, director Ron Howard talks about the making of his new film, Apollo 13. That's on Good Morning America tomorrow on this ABC station. And that's our report for tonight. I'm Ted Koppel in Washington. For all of us here at ABC News, good night. Nightline (ABC), June 27, 1995 The preceding text has been professionally transcribed. However, although the text has been checked against an audio track, in order to meet rigid distribution and transmission deadlines, it has not yet been proofread against videotape. LANGUAGE: ENGLISH LOAD-DATE: June 29, 1995