WASHINGTON, D.C.—The revived bill known as the EARN IT Act, which would eliminate certain protections provided by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, passed the Senate Judiciary Committee Thursday with no objections from any member, multiple news outlets have reported.
The bill—which director Evan Greer of digital rights group Fight for the Future called "one of the most poorly conceived and dangerous pieces of Internet legislations I have seen in my career"—was first introduced by Republican Senator Lindsay Graham and Democrtic Senator Richard Blumenthal in March 2020 ostensibly as a means to curb online "sex trafficking" and child sexual abuse material (CSAM), but died without a vote when the 116th congressional session closed January 1, 2021.
Graham and Blumenthal recently reinroduced the bill (whose name stands for "Eliminating Abuse and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technology") under the pretense that it is "calibrated to really stop the most detestable and despicable kinds of child abuse involving really horrific pornographic images that follow these kids all their lives," as Blumenthal framed it in The Washington Post's coverage today of EARN IT's advancement.
Much like in the case of predecessor SESTA-FOSTA, however, this bill has been largely decried by many in both adult and the internet community at large for posing a tremendous threat to free speech while doing little to eradicate the supposedly targeted harms. As tech outlet Gizmodo recapped today, "Civil liberty and digital rights groups have spoken out in droves against the bill, claiming it would roll back privacy protections for internet users and incentivize internet companies to engage in dangerous levels of surveillance and censorship far exceeding the purview of CSAM material."
Non-profit organization the Electronic Frontier Foundation warned in a recent statement, "The bill empowers every U.S. state or territory to create sweeping new Internet regulations, by stripping away the critical legal protections for websites and apps that currently prevent such a free-for-all—specifically Section 230. The states will be allowed to pass whatever type of law they want to hold private companies liable, as long as they somehow relate their new rules to online child abuse."
EARN IT now moves on to the Senate floor, but is likely to see revisions before it gets put to a full Senate vote. Noted the Post, "Multiple lawmakers, including Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Jon Ossof (D-Ga.) and Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), echoed [opponents'] concerns, and called on the bill's leading co-sponsors to address them before it sees a vote from the full Senate."
