Legal filter

[Thaddeus P. Bejnar]

Diane Parham wrote:

>We've been given an attorney's opinion that "if a library exercises
>content control over the information available of the Internet, it may be
>held liable  ...

I believe that this opinion may be based on the Prodigy case out of New
York, where Prodigy held themselves out as "family" and failed to prevent
access to pornography.  The case is a couple of years old and frequently
cited for the proposition that poor control is worse than no control.

I would  be wary of making any claims that "these terminals are safe for
children," regardless of the quality of the filtering software.  I
think even with filtering a library should take the position that "if
you wish to control what your child sees or hears, then monitor your 
child."

David Burt wrote in part:
> The Cox/Wyden amendment establishes protection for 
>'Good Samaritan' blocking and screening of offensive material. 

I am not sure that this protects against negligence, nor that
there are not courts that might impose strict liability  in cases
involving the exposure of children to porn.

We have not had the problem of unsupervised minors using our public
terminals yet, I hope we don't.

Thaddeus P. Bejnar   <thaddeus at trail.com>
State Law Librarian
Supreme Court Law Library (NM)
Santa Fe, New Mexico

None of my opinions ever represent the judiciary.
None of the above should be construed as legal advice.