Last week's P2P child pornography crackdown is helping Rep. Joe Pitts (R-Pa.) to search support for his bill that restricts P2P software distribution. The bill, called Protecting Children from Peer-to-Peer Pornography (P4) Act would require the Federal Trade Commission to regulate peer-to-peer networks and take steps to ensure that children aren't accidentally coming across porn. Pitt praised the action but he thinks the Feds are just being reactive:
"Friday's announcement is a disturbing confirmation that Peer-to-Peer programs are being manipulated. They are becoming an ever more dangerous platform used by child predators – some convicted child molesters – to attack kids.
His bill calls on the FTC to require P2P companies to get parental permission before minors use their networks. It also would require P2P clients to be subjected to settings of parents that put a "do not install" beacon in their computers, indicating that they don't want P2P software on their machines.
1. While protecting innocents from hardcore porn is a worth goal, I find it hard to understand why P2P is the target unless it is just a smoke screen by the RIAA and the Hollywood lobby.
IRC, Usenet, the web and spam filled email boxes are just as likely to expose childeren to Porn as P2P.
Posted at 4:29AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Online Music Blog