CIPA: Internet Filtering in Schools and Libraries
Minors are being exposed to more adult content today due to the Internet. The Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) was created to prevent children from accessing obscene or harmful content in schools and libraries. Yet there are groups that want to abolish the law because they feel it violates their first amendment rights of freedom of speech. CIPA is trying to protect children from viewing content not intended for them just like an R rated movie is not for children under seventeen years of age. Internet filters are needed in schools and libraries to keep minors from accessing sexually explicit, violent or otherwise adult in nature content.
CIPA ("Federal Communications Commission: Children’s Internet Protection Act," 2014) was first passed into law in December of 2000. Schools and libraries that received federal E-Rate funding and discounts must certify that they have internet filtering to prevent minors from viewing obscene or harmful content.
“Schools subject to CIPA have two additional certification requirements: 1) their Internet safety policies must include monitoring the online activities of minors; and 2) as required by the Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act, they must provide for educating minors about appropriate online behavior, including interacting with other individuals on social networking websites and in chat rooms, and cyberbullying awareness and response.”("Federal Communications Commission Children’s Internet Protection Act," 2014, para. 3)

Schools have a responsibility to act as a guardian of the minor while he/she is under the care of the school. They must use the best judgment to protect all students from pre-kindergarten to high school seniors. Filtering the Internet of material that is not suitable for them is just one of the many ways schools must act as a responsible guardian of the child. A teacher cannot show a Rated R movie in the classroom without parent permission, so they should not be able to use an unfiltered Internet without parental knowledge.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and American Library Association (ALA) both filed lawsuits to have the CIPA laws reversed. They both argued that the law violated the first amendment and prevented freedom of speech. They also argued that internet filters were ineffective and erratic and allowed either too much content to be blocked or did not block the intended content (American Civil Liberties Union, 2002). A mainstay in all of the arguments has been the inability to search for the topic of breast cancer. The ALA has said that because of the word “breast” in the topic of breast cancer the internet filters blocked all websites concerning this topic. The web filter appliances that are produced today have numerous categories that now can allow health related information. The web filters can also differentiate between a key word and a topic.
“Filters should not impede or restrict a students or teacher’s legitimate activity if it does you need to check you are using the correct solution and that the setting and policies in place are as you need them. Many teachers and students find filtering system overly restrictive for example not allowing access to some classic literature sites based on perhaps some inappropriate filtering policy setting.” (Hunt, 2012, para. 2)

They believe the filters over block content that is needed and under block content that is required to be blocked by CIPA. The main focus of their argument has been how CIPA impacts adults in libraries and schools. According to the ALA (ALA Library Fact Sheet, 2014) 35% of the material they offer is for children and over 65% of the libraries users are children. With these statistics children are still the majority of the patrons of public libraries, and thus libraries and schools need to do their best to protect the children while they are on their premises.
Libraries also feel that the cost of the web filters is too expensive. This can range between $2,000 and $8,000 dollars and have another $1,200 in subscription fees. The subscription covers the constant updates of sites that are added daily to the block site list. Due to the Internet’s rapid daily growth of 100,800 domains and 822,240 websites created daily the need for a subscription to the web filter is a must. (Woollaston, 2013) Only a major company with resources focused on attempting to keep up with that amount of data, and decide how to classify the content could offer this type of safe updates. In 2014 the FCC increased the E-Rate funding to 2.4 billion dollars to be divided up among each states schools and public libraries. The E-Rate program is divided into two different categories, which determines what services are eligible for the subsidy: Priority One: digital transmission services to provide connection to a school building, Internet access, including wireless, telephone services, including 800 numbers, long distance and voicemail, web hosting and VOIP. Priority Two: commonly known as internal connections including, routers, wireless network components, servers and basic maintenance and repair to internal systems. To apply for this funding, an updated school technology plan is required. ("National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP)," 2014) The need for E-Rate funding has increased and E-Rate funding reform has been purposed to help small and rural schools and libraries received the same amount of funding per student as those in large cities. In 2013, the entire state of Nebraska receive $12,046,555 for 213,555 students for a total of $56.52 per student. Yet one school district in California received $11,888,273 for 14,996 students for a total of $792.76 per student. (Jolley, 2013) With E-Rate reform, all schools should be able to have up to date technology that can offer schools a safe and secure learning environment.
Internet filters have come a long way since they were invented in the late 1990s. Rating and filtering systems were developed in response to concerns about pornography and other controversial material on the Internet. Companies began to produce internet filter appliances to help schools and libraries become CIPA complaint. Internet or Web filters as the industry calls them, are made by many different companies with varying levels of settings that allow for general to very specific filtering. Lightspeed Systems, WebTitan, Barracuda Networks, Cisco and SonicWALL are among the industry leaders in web filters. (SC Magazine, 2014) Having worked with Barracuda Networks web filters, I have seen how the web filter itself works with CIPA but allows for different settings for different users. By classifying Uniform Resource Locator (URL, also known as web) into 95 different categories it allows the administrator to best manage a website that may or may not need blocked. New sites are created every day and Barracuda continuously updates their list of sites that may or may not need to be blocked. Since the Barracuda Web Filter sits inline on the network, all traffic passes through it. Their web filters have the ability to intercept, manage, and redirect, not only curious young Web surfers, but spyware and malware as well. Google Chrome is blocked by most organizations because Chrome has built a browser that has the ability to bypass most web filters due to plug-ins and the availability of Google Chrome Portable which can be installed on thumb drives. There are multiple websites that give users information on how to attempt to sneak past web filters using third party proxy servers.
One of the hurdles many schools are experiencing is the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act ("COPPA") and how it directly affects CIPA. Under the terms of CIPA and COPPA, a user will not disclose, use, disseminate, or divulge personal and/or private information about himself/herself, minors, or any others, including personal identification information, except to authorized users for authorized purposes. COPPA states “It is unlawful for an operator of a website or online service directed to children, or any operator that has actual knowledge that it is collecting personal information from a child, to collect personal information from a child in a manner that violates the regulations prescribed under subsection.”(COPPA, 2013, figure 1) If a school is not enforcing the CIPA laws and students can access sites where they can enter information about themselves then they would also be in violation of COPPA. School’s network security also must be extremely tight so the information cannot be either leaked or hacked so outsiders could have access to the student’s information.
Parents have the right to filter the Internet in their homes through settings on their PC or tablet. Parents also have the right to filter the television and movies their children view. Parents can monitor the amount of time their children spend on the Internet and specifically what sites their children are visiting, but they are not present to protect their children in the classroom. Media sources like the movies and recording artists have had rating systems to classify their content to protect young children from viewing adult themes. Adults still have the choice if they want to watch a G rated or an X rated movie, but the rating system is in place to protect young children, much like the CIPA laws are intended to do. The choices parents make about what they let their children view while they are in their own homes is different than those in public places. There have been many incidents where people have been cited for viewing pornography in vehicles. This case in Fort Worth, Texas is an excellent example: “Fort Worth police issued a citation for a 24-year-old man accused of watching pornography on his car DVD player. Cameron J. Walker of Irving yesterday was issued misdemeanor citations for obscene display or distribution, not having a driver's license and having an open container of alcohol. An officer on patrol noticed the pornographic images inside the car as it drove by and then parked near a club. Police say the images of "multiple naked people" on the 10-inch screen could be seen by someone walking outside the vehicle” (KBTX-TV Channel 3, 2007).

How is this different than an adult viewing content at a library and a minor coming up to them and seeing inappropriate content? It’s not and this is just an example of the many reasons that the CIPA law is needed. Filters on public use computers are needed to block pornographic websites and other sexual explicit material so adult users cannot display inappropriate images for minors as they pass by.
Libraries and schools can chose if they want to block social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, Imgur, Pinterest and Vine. These sites have many age appropriate attributes items on them for users of all ages to use, but all also contain obscene or harmful content not meant for minors. Another reason social networking sites are blocked is due to cyberbullying. Even though sites like Facebook have potential for students to use them in a classroom setting, the problems with cyberbullying have become too great. The potential threat of cyberbullying is illustrated, “One million children were harassed, threatened or subjected to other forms of cyberbullying on Facebook during the past year.” (Cyberbullying Statistics, 2013, figure 8).
“Schools subject to CIPA have two additional certification requirements: 1) their Internet safety policies must include monitoring the online activities of minors; and 2) they must provide for educating minors about appropriate online behavior, including interacting with other individuals on social networking websites and in chat rooms, cyberbullying awareness and response.”(Federal Communications Commission Children’s Internet Protection Act, 2014, para. 3) There are various software programs that allow the teacher, information technology staff and other administrators to monitor students while they are using computers. Lanschool, NetSupport School, Faronics Insight and DyKnow Monitor are among the industry leaders in monitoring software. (Computer Classroom Control Software, 2013) By monitoring students in a real time situation allows the staff to prevent students from attempting to bypass the web filters, verify they are not attempting to view inappropriate content and prevent them from trying to change the setting on the computer. These programs also allow the staff to take control of the student’s computer if they feel the student is not following the Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) or displaying inappropriate online behavior. Teenagers are the main demographic for this kind of software. They often search for items that can be deemed inappropriate for minors and would not be a suitable topic to be discussing at school. Due to the differences in which teenagers mature there can often be a wide variety of topics that two thirteen year olds would search for while on the internet. The AUP that schools have the students agree to a set of rules for the students to follow while they are using a computer. From attempting bypass the web filter to cyberbullying the AUP helps teach children appropriate online behavior. Schools are also creating Digital Citizenship for their students. Digital Citizenship is a concept which helps teachers, technology leaders and parents to understand what student users should know to use technology appropriately. By having the students pass different exams, they able to learn different concepts and get “badges” in that Digital Citizenship category. Technology should enable education, not inhibit it due to the students and teachers not creating a safe and knowledgeable environment for learning while online. With education students can learn to properly use the Internet and learn about the threats that may be lurking on the Internet. Since most student have access to an unfiltered Internet at home, teaching Digital Citizenship in schools is a way to protect the students when they are away from school.
One way the schools and libraries can filter the Internet is by users. This allows adults to have a less restricted Internet and a high filtered Internet for minors. This is not against CIPA law and it allows schools and libraries a great way to accommodate the different users. Web filters and the networks they reside upon and either filter the Internet by the user or the PC. By filtering for the user the school or libraries would set up user accounts for the PC that would filter the Internet per the level of the setting for the user. In libraries to use the Internet a user may need to check in with the librarians and then be given an assigned PC. Their user name and password to sign in on the PC would be given by the staff and they would return with an “internet use card” when they are done, just like when they check out a book. Another way to accommodate the different levels of users would be to place the PC’s in different areas. This way a group of PC’s by the children’s section could be set up for a higher level of filtering than and adults computer section.
With technology advancing extremely fast, schools and libraries need to be willing to receive advanced training in technology or have a technology department to help take care of all of the issues that arise with it. Public libraries offer an average of sixteen public computers per location plus the staff’s computers (four on average) and the network and web filter every library could have a full time information technology department employee to keep their facility running ("Public Libraries & Technology," 2014). The IT employee could also help train the others in the best ways to handle the CIPA laws. This would make for a CIPA compliant library that would offer more to adult users also. Libraries must realize that as technology advances the needs of the library must change also and they may need to offer less in the way of research books and offer more computers which would mean a greater need for a technology department. From the article CIPA at 10: Internet Filtering Excessive, Study Finds | ALA Midwinter Meeting (Bayliss, 2014) the panel at this meeting consisted of member of the ALA that are unhappy with the CIPA laws. They did not get a perspective of librarians that are happy with the law. The perspective offers one that all libraries are unhappy with a law that protects them from possible litigation due to a minor seeing content not ended for them. Every library has a Library Use Policy that has explanations of content and actions that are not allowed in the libraries. The Denver Public Library has a Library Use Policy that does not allow content that may be offensive to others ("Denver Public Library," 2014).
The CIPA law is not internet censorship like what the Chinese government has done to its citizens. It does not prevent users from accessing information that would be used in an educational way or censor freedom of speech. CIPA only censors content not intended for minors that mat be harmful or obscene. I am in no way in favor of censoring the entire Internet for everybody, but when it comes to minors we must tread cautiously so they are not exposed to content that they are not yet mature enough to understand. The Internet is a great teaching tool and I think it should be used in the classroom, but should be used responsibly so that the Internet is used to aid in a child’s educational process. A filtered Internet helps children learn but still at the same time protects children from harmful content, “a flexible a powerful web filter will allow the user to easily fine tune policies eliminating the frustration caused by being overly restrictive. Some believe that filtering should be limited to pornography, which in the only thing the law requires and access should be allowed to other objectionable material under teacher supervision. The argument is that this help student to learn.”(Hunt, 2012, para. 3)
Internet censorship, especially for children is a topic that is not specific to the United States and CIPA. This is a topic of concern in the UK also, “The government is thinking about placing restrictions on access to some Internet sites because they are worried about children accessing inappropriate material. This would happen through Internet filtering, which is an effort to prevent Internet users from accessing particular websites. There are also proposals for more censorship for other reasons, including to stop access to sites related to terrorism and to try to prevent copy right infringement. This briefing is focused on the child protection issue” ("Open Rights Group," 2012, para. 1) There were new proposals in the UK for Internet filters that would block adult content and that would be turned on by default. It is important that restrictions on access should require an explicit decision by those wanting to turn filtering on – most likely parents. And the government should not force ISPs to offer ISP-level filtering. Filtering can be based on either a ‘blacklist’ or a ‘whitelist’ of websites. A whitelist is a list of sites that a filtering tool allows the user to see. Whitelists tend to be small and therefore well categorized. They are better suited to younger users, but do not scale well. A blacklist is a list of sites that a filtering tool should block. Given that there are millions of websites, blacklists are typically created through some form of automated classification process.
Those who oppose CIPA know that the law will never be overturned due the unfortunate amount of content that is not suitable for minors. They need to embrace the technology that is out there, by learning how to either be the web filter administrator or hiring an Information Technology Specialist that can help with the entire network. With the more information coming to us in a digital form, being able to help adults or minors access information safely is a necessity. The Internet is a powerful tool for both entertainment and educational purposes, but there are also a lot of sites with sexual and violet content that is not suitable for all age groups and that is why the CIPA laws were passed and need to be continued to be enforced, and improvements have continued to be made to the web filters so that the proper content can be either viewed or blocked. References

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