Digital Free Speech at Risk, Industry Officials Warn
Industry officials and a law professor said Americans risk having their digital free-speech rights impeded, amid increased overseas regulation of the Internet. Their concerns ranged from the effect of a European court ruling on U.S. web content to efforts by some nations to get the U.N. to help oversee digital communications. At a Wednesday Media Institute luncheon, Mike Regan, 21st Century Fox executive vice president, Jackie Ruff, a Verizon vice president, and the University of Pennsylvania's Christopher Yoo said the American public is at risk of having digital free speech rights impeded, as some governments seek to gain more control over the Internet.
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Part of the issue is that America's founding fathers intentionally made the language of the First Amendment murky, Regan said. Although legislation has been passed in some states and there's a call for the U.N. to create a committee specifically to oversee digital communications, Regan said the varying perception of what free speech entails in the Western world alone makes it difficult to create one-size-fits-all legislation.
Yoo reminded the audience that when the Internet emerged in the 1990s, then-President Bill Clinton said regulating the Internet would be like nailing Jell-O to a wall. “Well, China has done well at nailing Jell-O to a wall,” Yoo said. Similarly, nations such as Turkey have forced American companies such as Google to remove videos from its website, Yoo said. That's why Ruff said companies like Verizon believe that when it comes to digital free speech rights, we're “trending in the wrong direction.”
None of the panelists shared a possible solution to how the digital world could be regulated while preserving free-speech rights. Regan said the answer lies somewhere in the middle. Republicans emphasize that totalitarian regimes will control the Internet unless there is private control, he said, while at the other end of the political spectrum there's a push for no rules or laws. Regan said this anarchist approach to the Internet essentially means there won't be any transparency on how rules are adopted or enforced, allowing a “wild, wild West” to prevail online.
Americans may have a hard time believing big telecom companies such as Verizon and Hollywood studios such as Fox have an interest in preserving their free-speech rights more than the government does, Yoo said. But he said that around the world -- including in several large European nations, which he declined to name -- companies are kowtowing to what governments want on Internet regulation, except in the U.S.
“If U.S. companies don't stand up, no one will,” said Yoo, expressing concern for what may happen if the U.S. reached a point where information disseminated at educational institutions were controlled by the government. “People sacrifice human rights for economic development in developing countries,” Yoo said. Ruff agreed and said Verizon consider human rights when it comes to policies.