The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia reinforced the 2007 decision regarding the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), declaring it to be vague, overly broad and unconstitutional. COPA is a 1998 law intended to protect minors from objectionable material on the Internet.

The legal battle evolving around this law started a decade ago, when the same court struck down the law, calling it unconstitutional and in violation of freedom of speech. The law would basically require U.S. commercial sites to stop offering “material harmful to minors” defined by “contemporary community standards.”

According to the ruling, COPA criminalizes a category of speech constitutionally protected for adults, while at the same time, it is not the least restrictive alternative, breaks the First Amendment rights, it is impermissibly vague and overbroad.

Chris Hansen, Senior Staff Attorney with ACLU First Amendment Working Group, said “the government has no more right to censor the Internet than it does books and magazines,” highlighting that despite years of repeated attempts to “thwart freedom of speech on the Internet”, the courts have found these attempts to be unconstitutional every time.

In 2004, the Supreme Court banned the enforcement of the law, sending it back to the District Court for updates on the factual record, to reflect current technological realities. In March 2007, the court’s decision struck down COPA once more.

The government repeatedly appealed the decisions, and it is highly probable that they will do it again this time. However, the court continues to believe that “filters are a less restrictive alternative than COPA for advancing the Government’s compelling interest at stake in this litigation.”

Furthermore, the court found that COPA “endangers a wide range of communications, exhibits and speakers whose messages do not comport with the type of harmful materials legitimately targeted under COPA.”