Texas Bill to Filter Highway Rest Stop Internet 627
girlchik writes "HB 3314, up for hearing in the Texas House State Affairs committee on Monday, would require the state to filter wireless internet access at highway rest stops. This bill mandates filtering at any state-provided wireless network on public property.
Since last May, the Texas Department of Transportation has offered wifi access at state rest stops. There is also wifi access at some Texas state parks provided in partnership with Tengo Internet.
This bill protects truckers at highway rest stops and campers in their RVs at campsites from adult content.
Sounds both wasteful and unconstitutional."
Interesting Issue (Score:5, Informative)
On the one hand the first ammendment certainly does not require libraries to provide pornographic magazines or otherwise provide some unbiased representation of viewpoints. In general the first ammendment does not restrict the government from providing some content but not others (except when this infringes on the establishment clause).
However, while library filtering has been deemed constitional the supreme court has also ruled that libraries must allow adults to bypass the filters. In other words apparently the supreme court has recognized that internet filtering is significantly different than buying library books. The library has legitimate financial constraints in what books it provides but does not in internet filtering. [cdt.org]
So the question becomes very unclear in the case of truck stops. Since these are entierly automated they can't very well demand a librarian turn the filtering off. Still, since one does need to be at least 16 to drive and because of the real possibility that by providing enough government internet access filtering could stifle free speech I imagine it would be declared unconstitutional but it is a tough call.
Re:What does "may" mean? (Score:2, Informative)
Evidently, anytime the issue of net filtering is mentioned on /. the 1st amendment crowd starts hootin' and hollerin' about rights, etc.
You make a very good point. Net access is not a right and the State of Texas providing a free service to the public does not constitute the establishment of a new right. Also, you're right about libraries. They don't stock hard-core porn so why should they provide it via the internet? If someone desperately needs porn they should go buy it with their own money.
One thing that both of these have in common is they are both services provided to the public free of charge with tax payer money. I would not want to fund the porn addiction of some trucker driving through my state.
Re:I dunno about both. (Score:5, Informative)
If that were the real intent, they could set up a content-neutral form of blocking, based on actual bandwidth usage.
Re:Filtering software (Score:1, Informative)
Re:What does "may" mean? (Score:3, Informative)
Committee & Hearing Info (Score:2, Informative)
It looks like if part (b) was struck from the bill, it would apply only to prisons, but somewhere in the process someone complained about prisoners being singled out, I bet, so they reworked the bill to include this provision.
The hearing of the House State Affairs Committee is scheduled for 8AM in room E2.010 of the Texas State Capitol. This is a public hearing, so I'd urge anyone who's in the Austin area to attend.
The committee's website is available at http://www.capitol.state.tx.us/cgi-bin/db2www/tlo
This site also links to a page with each representative's contact information. That second page links to their "personal" page on the Texas House of Representatives which has an "email me" form at the bottom, so you can easily email each representative on the committee about this bill.
Re:Filesharing? (Score:5, Informative)
Honestly they are on the roads for hours alone they cant drink so what else is left , smoking and porn.
Anyway if they filter out the porn
the whole argument is illogical as truckers pay taxes too.
Prudish attitudes are immature and what this boils down too is some moralist politican trying to force his belifes(of things that will get him votes) on others.
Truckers are one of the backbone of the western world , so lets cut them some slack here and allow them to look at some porn when they are on a break
Read The Constitution (Score:3, Informative)
I agree completely that filtering Internet access is a Bad Thing, but it's not unconstitutional. I'm assuming that the submitter implied that filtering Internet access on public properties would be infringing the Constitution's protection of free speech. Would the government's refusal to provide ANY Internet access constitute a violation of the Free Speech Clause? Of course not. So why would the government providing partial access to the Internet pose a question of Constitutionality?
Re:I dunno about both. (Score:1, Informative)
Of course, Bobby is only 13. So lawsuit.
If they have filtering software installed, they are taking a reasonable action to prevent this from occuring. It doesn't matter that he got this from NNTP or his YaHoo groups or webmail, which cannot be blocked.
As long as the state takes reasonable action, then they are protected.
Re:Filesharing? (Score:3, Informative)
You can persuade the legislature to pass a law to filter it.
Go ahead, lobby to get all the laws you like passed, it won't do you one whit of good because the Supreme Court will just use those bills for toilet paper. Don't believe me? Try reading up [google.com] on the the CDA (Communications decency act) and COPA (Child Online rotection Act) and ChIPA (Children's Internet Protection Act).
The Supreme Coprt has explicitly stated that it is unconstitutional for the government to attempt to impose content based censorship on my library internet access simply because you dislike the content. Truck stop access is no different.
Lobby and vote all you like, you cannot get yourself a law to content-filter my access and violate the first amendment simply because you dislike the content. You can't vote through a filter against insulting Bush, you cannot vote through a filter against supporting Bush, you can't vote through a filter against religion, and you can't vote through a filter against pornography.
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So tired (Score:3, Informative)