There always seems to be some confusion between the Children's Online Protection Act (COPA) and the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), especially when one tosses in a third law, the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA).
COPA was passed into legislation in 1998 and was immediately placed under injunction by a U.S. Court of Appeals due to the action of the American Civil Liberties Association (ACLU). This law was was intended to prevent minors (persons under the age of 18) from accessing pornography by forcing those websites to protect themselves from access by children. This was an expansion and/or clarification of the Communications Decency Act that was ruled unconstitutional in 1997. After surfacing in the courts multiple times, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal and therefore is considered to be under permanent injunction and not enforceable.
COPPA was also legislated in 1998 but serves a completely different purpose than its more litigious cousin COPA. This is the law that requires websites to not collect information on users under thirteen (13) years of age. When you sign up for an account on a website, you will often notice a "tick box" that requires you to certify that you are at least 13 years of age. That "tick box" exists because of this law. Over that years, there have been several companies and non-profit organizations fined by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for not adhering to this law.
Finally, CIPA was brought into existence during the 2000 legislative session. This law holds that any organization (schools and libraries) receiving discounts via the federal E-Rate program must utilize a Internet-filtering measure to prevent access by minors to obscene or otherwise harmful content. There are also some policy requirements for the organizations with minors accessing online communication (including chat rooms, email, etc.). This law is administered by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
Wow. Now my brain hurts.
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