View source for Child Online Protection Act

{{Short description|Former U.S. law to protect minors from certain material on the Internet}}
{{distinguish|text=the [[Children's Online Privacy Protection Act]] (COPPA) or the [[Children's Internet Protection Act]] (CIPA)}}
{{Use American English|date=June 2025}}
{{Infobox U.S. legislation
| shorttitle        = Child Online Protection Act
| othershorttitles  =
| longtitle         = <!--Starts "An act to..."-->
| colloquialacronym = COPA
| nickname          = 
| enacted by        = <!--Name of Congress. (e.g. 1st, 10th, 100th). Auto-links to corresponding page. Adding other characters breaks the link-->
| effective date    = 
| public law url    = 
| cite public law   = {{uspl|105|277}}
| cite statutes at large = {{USStat|112|2681-736}}
| acts amended    = 
| acts repealed   = 
| title amended   = 47
| sections created = {{USC|47|231}}
| sections amended = 
| leghisturl      = https://www.congress.gov/bill/105th-congress/house-bill/4328
| introducedin    = House
| introducedbill  = H.R. 4328
| introducedby    = <!--sponsor(s)-->
| introduceddate  = 
| committees      = 
| passedbody1     = 
| passeddate1     = 
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| passedas2       = <!-- used if the second body changes the name of the legislation -->
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| agreedbody3     = <!-- used when the other body agrees without going into committee -->
| agreeddate3     = <!-- used when the other body agrees without going into committee -->
| agreedvote3     = <!-- used when the other body agrees without going into committee -->
| agreedbody4     = <!-- used if agreedbody3 further amends legislation -->
| agreeddate4     = <!-- used if agreedbody3 further amends legislation -->
| agreedvote4     = <!-- used if agreedbody3 further amends legislation -->
| passedbody4     = 
| passeddate4     = 
| passedvote4     = 
| signedpresident = [[Bill Clinton]]
| signeddate      = October 21, 1998
| unsignedpresident = <!-- used when passed without presidential signing -->
| unsigneddate    = <!-- used when passed without presidential signing -->
| vetoedpresident = <!-- used when passed by overriding presidential veto -->
| vetoeddate      = <!-- used when passed by overriding presidential veto -->
| overriddenbody1 = <!-- used when passed by overriding presidential veto -->
| overriddendate1 = <!-- used when passed by overriding presidential veto -->
| overriddenvote1 = <!-- used when passed by overriding presidential veto -->
| overriddenbody2 = <!-- used when passed by overriding presidential veto -->
| overriddendate2 = <!-- used when passed by overriding presidential veto -->
| overriddenvote2 = <!-- used when passed by overriding presidential veto -->
| amendments      = 
| SCOTUS cases    = {{ubl|''[[Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union|Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union I]]'' {{ussc|535|564|2002}}|''[[Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union#Second Opinion of the Court|Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union II]]'', {{ussc|542|656|2004}}}}
}}

The '''Child Online Protection Act''' ('''COPA''') was an American statute, passed in 1998, with the declared purpose of restricting access to any material defined as harmful to minors on the [[Internet]]. The statute never took effect as three separate rounds of [[litigation]] led to a permanent [[injunction]] against it in 2009.

The statute was part of a series of efforts by American lawmakers to regulate and restrict [[Internet pornography]] and other types of [[United States obscenity law|indecent or obscene]] material. The earlier [[Communications Decency Act]] had been struck down as [[unconstitutional]] by the [[United States Supreme Court|Supreme Court]] in ''[[Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union|Reno v. ACLU]]'' in 1997.<ref>{{ussc|name=Reno v. Am. Civil Liberties Union|link=Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union|volume=521|page=844|year=1997}}.</ref> COPA was a direct response to that decision, narrowing the range of material covered. COPA only limited [[commercial speech]] and only affected content creators based in the United States. COPA also attempted to replace the previous statute's restrictions on "obscenity" and "indecency" with a rhetorical focus on protecting children from harm.

COPA required all commercial distributors of "material harmful to minors" to restrict their sites from access by under-age children. That content was defined as material that by "[[Miller test|contemporary community standards]]" was judged to appeal to the "prurient interest" and that showed [[Human sexual activity|sexual acts]] or [[nudity]] (including [[breast|female breasts]]). This is a much broader standard than [[obscenity]].<ref name=":0" />

== Legal history ==
{{further|Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union}}
The [[American Civil Liberties Union]] (ACLU), as it had for the earlier Communications Decency Act, immediately challenged COPA in court on consistutional grounds. In February 1999, Judge [[Lowell A. Reed Jr.]] of the [[United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania|U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania]] issued a [[Injunction|preliminary injunction]] blocking the enforcement of COPA as a violation of the [[First Amendment to the United States Constitution|First Amendment]], as it used insufficiently defined terms to restrict speech-related content.<ref>{{cite court |litigants=American Civil Liberties Union v. Reno |vol=31 |reporter=F. Supp. 2d |opinion=473 |pinpoint= |court=[[E.D. Pa.]] |date=1999 |url=https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp2/31/473/2516214/ |accessdate=2020-04-16 |quote=}}</ref> In 1999, the [[United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit|Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit]] upheld the injunction and struck down the statute, ruling that it was too [[Overbreadth doctrine|broad]] in using "community standards" as part of its definition of harmful Internet content.<ref>{{cite court |litigants=American Civil Liberties Union v. Reno |vol=217 |reporter=F.3d |opinion=162 |pinpoint= |court=[[3d Cir.]] |date=2000 |url=https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F3/217/162/494956/ |accessdate=2018-08-12 |quote=}}</ref>

In May 2002, the [[Supreme Court of the United States|U.S. Supreme Court]] reviewed this ruling in ''[[Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union]]'' (2002), and found the Circuit Court's reasoning insufficient and [[Remand (court procedure)|remanded]] the case back to that court,<ref name="Ward">{{Cite web |last=Ward |first=Artemus |title=Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union |url=https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/377/ashcroft-v-american-civil-liberties-union |access-date=2022-09-05 |website=www.mtsu.edu |language=en}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{ussc|name=Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union|link=Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union|volume=535|page=564|year=2002}}.</ref> where the injunction remained in effect as the legal proceedings continued. In March 2003, the Third Circuit again struck down the statute as unconstitutional, this time finding that it would hinder protected speech among adults.<ref>{{cite court |litigants=American Civil Liberties Union v. Reno |vol=322 |reporter=F.3d |opinion=240 |pinpoint= |court=[[3d Cir.]] |date=2003 |url=https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F3/322/240/500633/ |accessdate=2018-08-12 |quote=}}</ref> The government again appealed to the Supreme Court.<ref>{{cite web | title=Ashcroft v. ACLU – The Legal Challenge to the Child Online Protection Act | work=Electronic Privacy Information Center | url=http://www.epic.org/free_speech/copa/ | access-date=January 19, 2006}}</ref>

In June 2004, in the second iteration of ''[[Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union#Second Opinion of the Court|Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union]]'', the Supreme Court upheld the injunction against enfocrcing the statute on First Amedment grounds. Notably, the court recommended software filters rather than government sanctions against content creators, per the findings of the Commission on Child Online Protection, which Congress created to evaluate the different techniques for restricting minors' ability to gain access to harmful material on the internet. The court also wrote that it had been five years since the district court had first considered the effectiveness of filtering software and that new and evolving software technologies would be [[Strict scrutiny|less restrcitive]] ways to shield children from certain types of content.<ref name=":12">{{ussc|name=Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union|link=Ashcroft v. American Civil Liberties Union|volume=542|page=656|year=2004}}.</ref> 

===Further proceedings===
Given the possible [[Government interest|compelling government interest]] in protecting children from harmful Internet content, the Supreme Court [[Remand (court procedure)|remanded]] the case back to the Eastern Pennsylvania District Court for a trial in which the government would be required to argue that its techniques were the [[Strict scrutiny|least restrictive]] means to achieve that goal. That trial begain in October 2006. The Department of Justice issued subpoenas to various search engines to obtain Web addresses and records of searches as part of a study undertaken by a witness in support of the statute. The search engines turned over the requested information, except for [[Google]] who challenged the subpoenas. The court limited the subpoena to a sample of URLs in Google's database, but declined to enforce the request for searches conducted by users; Google then complied.<ref>{{cite court |litigants=Gonzales v. Google, Inc. |vol=234 |reporter=F.R.D. |opinion=674 |pinpoint= |court=[[N.D. Cal.]] |date=2006 |url=https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//press/images/ruling_20060317.pdf |accessdate=2020-04-16 |quote=}}</ref>

In March 2007, the district court once again struck down COPA, finding the statute [[Facial challenge|facially]] in violation of the [[First Amendment to the United States Constitution|First]] and [[Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Fifth]] Amendments to the U.S Constitution.<ref>{{cite court |litigants=American Civil Liberties Union v. Gonzales |vol=478 |reporter=F. Supp. 2d |opinion=775 |pinpoint= |court=[[E.D. Pa.]] |date=2007 |url=https://www.leagle.com/decision/20071253478fsupp2d77511193 |accessdate=2020-04-16 |quote=}}</ref> In addition to the ACLU, several witnesses testified in defense of First Amendment rights on the Internet, including [[Marilyn Jaye Lewis]], director of the Erotic Authors Association.<ref>{{cite web | title=US District Court Transcripts| url=https://www.aclu.org/freespeech/internet/27171res20061023.html}}</ref> Judge Reed of the district court issued a permanent injunction against government enforcement of COPA, commenting that "perhaps we do the minors of this country harm if First Amendment protections, which they will with age inherit fully, are chipped away in the name of their protection."<ref>{{cite web | title=Judge Strikes '98 Law Aimed At Online Porn | date=22 March 2007 | agency=Associated Press | url=http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_5494735 | access-date=March 22, 2007}}</ref> The government again appealed, and the case was heard again before the Third Circuit.<ref name=":0">{{cite journal |url=http://jolt.law.harvard.edu/digest/uncategorized/aclu-v-mukasey |title=ACLU v. Mukasey; Third Circuit Holds Child Online Protection Act Unconstitutional |access-date=24 January 2009 |last=Lamut |first=Anna |date=3 August 2008 |publisher=Jolt Digest |journal=Harvard Journal of Law & Technology |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120712130258/http://jolt.law.harvard.edu/digest/uncategorized/aclu-v-mukasey |archive-date=12 July 2012 }}</ref> That court upheld the lower court's injunction in July 2008.<ref>{{cite magazine
| title=Net Censorship Law Struck Down Again
| url=http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/07/net-censorship.html
| access-date=July 22, 2008
| magazine=Wired
| first=Ryan
| last=Singel
| date=22 July 2008}}</ref><ref>{{cite court |litigants=American Civil Liberties Union v. Mukasey |vol=534 |reporter=F.3d  |opinion=181 |pinpoint= |court=[[3d Cir.]] |date=2008 |url=https://www.leagle.com/decision/2008715534f3d1811699 |accessdate=2020-04-16 |quote=}}</ref> The government attempted one more appeal to the Supreme Court, but that court turned down the request in January 2009,<ref>{{ussc|name=Mukasey v. American Civil Liberties Union|volume=555|page=1137|year=2009|el=no}}.</ref> effectively shutting down the statute.<ref>{{cite news|first=Mark |last=Sherman |title=Anti-Porn Online Law Dies Quietly in Supreme Court |url=https://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090121/ap_on_go_su_co/scotus_internet_blocking |agency=AP |work=Yahoo! News |date=21 January 2009 |access-date=24 January 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090124180944/http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090121/ap_on_go_su_co/scotus_internet_blocking |archive-date=January 24, 2009 }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |first=Scott |last=Nichols |title=COPA Child-Porn Law Killed |url=http://www.pcworld.com/article/158131/copa_childporn_law_killed.html |work=PC World |date=22 January 2009 |access-date=24 January 2009 |archive-date=15 June 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120615175127/http://www.pcworld.com/article/158131/copa_childporn_law_killed.html |url-status=dead }}</ref>

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

__NOTOC__

[[Category:United States federal communications legislation]]
[[Category:United States federal computing legislation]]
[[Category:United States pornography law]]
[[Category:Internet law in the United States]]
[[Category:Child safety]]
[[Category:Internet censorship in the United States]]
[[Category:Child online safety laws]]