With the ever-growing popularity of the Internet more and more people are concerned with the vast amounts of uncensored material that can be accessed. Although there have been many attempts to legally censor the Internet, thus far most have failed. The common thread that runs through each of these articles is the extent to which censorship should be applied to material on the Internet. Most all agree that to some degree there is already some forms of censorship being exercised today, especially outside of the United States. Although free speech is a constitutionally guaranteed right for American citizens, not everyone has this liberty. Countries in the East push the limits of censorship on the Internet even though only a small number of citizens have access to computers. Because the Internet is still a new medium of information it is difficult to interpret how censorship should be addressed and even who should address the issue. The fact that the Internet is a glob!

al source of information makes it even harder to place censorship restrictions based upon the United States Constitution.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has led the fight for free

Diamond and Bates (1995) also found that is some cases the online provider can be held accountable for pornographic material that is download from the Internet using their service or for material posted using their service. They also concluded that as the legal battles ensue the price for such services will reflect the cost of lengthy lawsuits. According to Cozac, several countries including Canada and Australia have enacted legislation that requires Internet service providers be held accountable for all materials transmitted through their service.(1998, 10)

Chao, Lena M., Ph.D.; Parachini, Allan; Hernandez, Fernando, Ph.D.; Cody, Michael J., Ph.D.; and Davis, Daniel Cochece. From Words to Weapons: The Violence Surrounding Our Schools. ACLU Foundation of Southern California.

Zimring, Franklin E. 1998. American Youth Violence (Studies in Crime and Public Policy). Oxford University Press.

Diamond and Bates (1995), Mosquera (1999) and Wise all tend to point out that the main focus of Internet censorship is to protect children from the raunchy material that can so easily be accessed by any user of the Web. Some providers are now offering "lock-out" accounts and some search engines are designed to block certain types of materials from searches (Diamond and Bates, 6). Other measures can now be used to censor material that can be accessed through the Internet, such as rating systems, filters and blocking software. According to Cozac, the filtering and blocking software can allow parents and educators to censor Internet material rather than trying to rely on the government to enact censorship. (1998, 16) Cozac points out that the rating system has many flaws, one of which would be the problem of punishment or penalties for mis-rating a site.(1998, 17)

rnography seems to be the main focus in the United States, other countries are dealing with the government censoring not only Internet material but also who is allowed to have access to the Internet. The military regime in Burma has outlawed use of the Internet and all computer users must be registered with the government and violators face seven to fifteen year prison terms (Cozac 1998, 4)

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1469
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)