The filtering controversy

[Steve]

Library Grapples With Protecting Internet Freedom

Katie Hafner
NY Times 10/15/98


AUSTIN, Tex. -- Just inside the entrance of the public library here
hangs a photograph of the building's namesake, John Henry Faulk, a
radio performer and humorist famous for his uncompromising defense
of free speech. 

Faulk, who was blacklisted in the McCarthy era but sued his
blacklisters and won, died in 1990. Were he alive today, Faulk would
no doubt shake his head at the tangle over free speech in which the
Faulk Central Library and the Austin Public Library branches now
find themselves. 

The Austin Public Library is one of hundreds of public libraries
around the country grappling with the question of whether to keep
objectionable material on the Internet from reaching computers
intended for public use, and, for those libraries that have decided
on blocking, how much blocking to do. After much soul-searching, the
Austin library installed filtering software on most of its
computers, a decision that divided the community, as it has many
others. 

In Loudoun County, Va., a group of library patrons who object to the
county library's filtering software on its computers, along with the
American Civil Liberties Union and Web publishers, have filed a
court case challenging the constitutionality of the practice. On the
opposite side of the continent -- and the debate -- in Livermore,
Calif., a parent is suing the public library, accusing it of failing
to restrict minors' access to pornographic Net content. Similar
conflicts are taking place across the country. 

The First Amendment issues raised by Internet filtering may seem
clear enough when public debate is at full tilt. But people's
positions are less clear in private as they struggle with their
commitment to free speech and their desire to protect children. 

Austin's two-year struggle, which is still unresolved, reflects the
national debate in all its complexity. At every step of the way,
librarians around the nation have watched Austin in search of
guidance, confirmation or any hook on which to hang a policy of
their own. 

Like her counterparts across the nation, Brenda Branch, the
energetic, high-spirited director of the Austin library, has been at
the center of the discussion. Like many other librarians, she has
always considered the defense of free speech to be part of her job
description. For most of the 23 years she has been at the Austin
library, that stand has presented her with no personal conflict. 

Ms. Branch's problems began in the summer of 1996, when computers
with unrestricted access to the Internet were placed in the main
library and its 19 branches. "Upholding freedom of speech becomes so
second nature to librarians that unrestricted access was our natural
fallback position," Ms. Branch said. "We almost didn't question it."

When staff members saw children looking at questionable sites, they
resorted to an ad hoc method of control -- cajoling them to move
elsewhere. 

They suddenly felt thrust into the role of parents. 

But things remained relatively quiet until a branch librarian
happened to walk past the library's printer one day and saw a
graphic depiction of child pornography emerging. "One look at this
and you knew it was illegal stuff," Ms. Branch said. As the librarian
was pulling the offending document out of the printer, whoever had
sent the print command disappeared. 

Coincidentally, a few days later, another library employee shot off
an angry letter to the local newspaper, the mayor, the City Council
and the city manager, charging the library with making pornography
available, in violation of the state's "harmful to minors" statute.
Texas is one of several states with a law prohibiting an adult from
knowingly displaying material considered harmful to anyone younger
than 18. 

"All of a sudden, it was like the dam broke," Ms. Branch said. She
met with her staff members, she said, and many of them broke down
and told her how uncomfortable they felt with unfettered Internet
access. Ms. Branch's employees, it turned out, were worried that they
could be arrested if they were thought to be exposing children to
pornography, however inadvertently. 

Lawyers for the city reinforced those fears. One option, which the
library swiftly rejected, was to remove Internet access from the
libraries altogether, Ms. Branch said. The lawyers then recommended
strongly that the library install software to filter objectionable
material. 

Within two weeks, the library had installed Cyber Patrol, a
filtering program popular among parents but much maligned among civil
libertarians, on the 52 public computers with Internet access. In
its haste, the library installed the software at full throttle. The
product was set up at its most restrictive so it blocked Web sites
promoting "intolerance," "alcohol and tobacco" and "illegal
gambling." 

Filtering products like those sold by Cyber Patrol often work by
searching Web sites for strings of what appear to be unseemly text.
Such a method can cause the words "Essex County," for example, to be
blocked, or "chicken breast." The company also maintains a
proprietary list of site addresses that it chooses to block, and it
updates the list regularly. 

Within a week, a stack of written complaints two inches thick had
arrived on Ms. Branch's desk. Many library patrons objected to being
subject to any censorship. Others complained about the software's
hamhanded blocking, which censored harmless sites while giving ready
access to others filled with obscene language and images. 

One library user conducted an Internet search for "toys." At the top
of the search results was "Toys 4 Lovers." At the same time, patrons
trying to retrieve Web sites dedicated to Georgia O'Keeffe and
Vincent Van Gogh were confronted by a computer screen flashing a
yellow Cyber Patrol police badge. An H.I.V. Information Center was
also found to be off limits. 

"It's operating like the K.G.B.!" one person complained. 

Another wrote, "Incensed that you would tell me as a parent what my
child should see and what they should not see." People even
complained that sites containing the name John Henry Faulk were
banned, presumably because of the proximity to one another of the
letters F, U and K. But Cyber Patrol says its software would not
exclude those kinds of sites. 

Ms. Branch's office in the Faulk Central Library in downtown Austin
is playfully decorated with stuffed animals and dishes of candy. On
her door frame is a magnet that reads: "Don't rush me. I'm making
mistakes as fast as I can." Inspired more by Gidget than gravitas,
Ms. Branch's office betrays no trace of the somber situations in
which the librarian has found herself. 

Ms. Branch, 51, was named director of the Austin public library
system in 1991. 

She said the only previous experience that foreshadowed the current
debate occurred in 1992, when Madonna's graphic book "Sex" sparked
an outcry from some parents and church groups. 

During the Madonna incident, as Ms. Branch refers to it, she was in
frequent touch with the American Library Association. "The A.L.A.
was an incredible source of support," she said. "I really depended on
them for information and legal advice." 

When the issue of filtering Internet content arose, however, the
A.L.A. left Ms. Branch trapped squarely between library science and
local politics. In late 1996, a few months after the library
introduced Internet access, Ms. Branch sought guidance from the
A.L.A. about whether to install filters. She was surprised to get a
sharp letter in reply, in which the A.L.A. endorsed the idea of
unrestricted Internet access for adults and minors alike. In July
1997, the A.L.A. issued a formal resolution condemning the use of
filtering software that blocks access to constitutionally protected
speech and recommended parental discretion. 

According to the A.L.A.'s Office for Information Technology Policy,
11,600 of the nation's nearly 16,000 libraries offer Internet
access, and some 15 percent of those have installed filtering
software. Most libraries, including many with filters, have an
"acceptable use" policy in place, which urges patrons to use the
Internet responsibly.

"Our policies are very carefully considered," said Richard Matthews,
deputy director of the Office for Intellectual Freedom at the A.L.A.
"We certainly have addressed the First Amendment implications of our
stance against filtering, and to take any position accepting
something less than that ideal stance would be unacceptable." 

Ms. Branch said she found the A.L.A.'s policy frustrating because it
fails to take into account the practical considerations of exposing
children to what she calls "some of the horrifying stuff out there."

That horrifying stuff is precisely what has given rise to the
pro-filtering position among a number of Austinites. "If we live in
a society that requires one to be 21 to drink, 18 to smoke, and last
I understood, 18 to purchase porno magazines, why is it free and
acceptable to view porno on the Internet at a public library?" one
Austin parent wrote to Ms. Branch. 

"My biggest dilemma," Ms. Branch said, "is how to balance the rights
of adults with the need to protect youth." 

Shortly after Austin installed filters, the A.C.L.U. condemned the
new practice. A.C.L.U. lawyers investigated the possibility of
filing a lawsuit to challenge the constitutionality of the library's
action.

Austin has long been known as a city more liberal than the rest of
the state. For nearly eight years, the city has been home to
Electronic Frontiers-Texas, a small but active group of civil
libertarians who focus on the rights of those who travel in
cyberspace. When members of the group heard about the library's
filters, they joined forces with the A.C.L.U. and complained to the
City Council, which controls the financing for the library. Invoking
an analogy often used when discussing library filtering, Jon
Lebkowsky, an EF-Texas member, said, "It came down to a fundamental
question: Are you taking books off the shelves, or are you
exercising the library's prerogative to select some books and not
others?" 

In March 1997, city officials convened a community roundtable, with
Ms. Branch and other librarians, EF-Texas, the A.C.L.U., the city,
and Jennifer Padden, a representative of the local P.T.A. 

After several weeks of debate, the library disabled the keyword
blocking and reduced the number of categories being filtered out to
four: "gross depictions," "sexual acts," "partial nudity" and "full
nudity." 

Now there are four unfiltered computers scattered around the library
system, with plans to have one unfiltered computer at each branch by
this time next year. The screens for the unfiltered machines are in
specially built recessed tables that keep the computer screens well
out of public view. Only patrons 18 and older may use an unfiltered
machine, and they must present proof of age. Minors cannot use the
machines even if they have parental permission slips or are
accompanied by parents. 

Now that fewer categories of Web sites are blocked and unfiltered
computers are available to adults, Ms. Branch said, complaints about
the filtering have diminished sharply. A library customer who
objects to the blocking of a certain site can complain to the library
staff, who can ask Cyber Patrol to stop blocking the site. 

Everyone agrees that the current setup in Austin is a fragile
compromise. From the point of view of EF-Texas and the A.C.L.U.,
which calls filtering "censorship in a box," it is an unacceptable
one. "The least filtering we're likely to get is still more
filtering than any of us want," said Jim Robinson, an EF-Texas member
who opposes filters. 

But EF-Texas members aren't completely in unison. While Robinson is
unwavering in his stance against any and all filtering, others, like
Mr. Lebkowsky, are less so. "There's the potential for libraries to
become like adult arcades if access to hard-core porn isn't somehow
restricted," said Mr. Lebkowsky. He said "minimal filtering" might
be the solution. 

Ms. Padden of the P.T.A. spoke passionately at the community
roundtable in favor of filtering, yet the computer she has at home
is unfiltered. When her children go on line, she goes with them. "I'd
like to think I've raised my kids with my values, and they respect
them," she said. "But there are probably 10 times more kids whose
parents don't have the time or the computer capability to understand
what their kids are looking at or doing at the library." 

Ultimately, legislation or a court ruling may set boundaries. Some
version of mandatory-filtering legislation for public libraries and
schools may become law as part of the appropriations bill being
considered this week in Congress. 

Librarians in Austin and elsewhere are also watching the Loudoun
County case. 

Ann Beeson, an A.C.L.U. lawyer who spends much of her time on Web
cases, said: "We hope the decision coming out of Loudoun will
heavily influence how other jurisdictions proceed. If we get a strong
decision in our favor, we'll feel even more confident in challenging
other jurisdictions trying to impose mandatory filtering." 

Eugene Volokh, a law professor at the University of California at
Los Angeles, speculated that a court might be more likely to accept
Internet filtering that, like Austin's, would affect only children.
"Then again," he added, "it's conceivable that a court will say the
library has a completely free hand, that blocking the Internet is
more like not buying the book in the first place." 

Ms. Beeson, who is monitoring the struggles over filtering in
several cities simultaneously, said the A.C.L.U. continued to watch
Austin closely. "It's still not off the radar screen," she said.
"We've just been eminently patient with Austin." 

Ms. Beeson said she approved of the plan to place an unfiltered
machine in every library branch, but she objects to the library's
uncompromising restrictions on minors, particularly older
teen-agers.

But Ms. Beeson said she also sympathized with Ms. Branch. "Like many
librarians, she's been caught between a rock and a hard place," Ms.
Beeson said. "Her instincts are in all the right places, but she's
in a very awkward position." 

Copyright 1998 The New York Times Company 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *  From the Listowner  * * * * * * * * * * * *
.	To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to:
majordomo at scn.org		In the body of the message, type:
unsubscribe scn
END