Net oversight board to consider .xxx domains

ICM Registry wants to establish .xxx designation for adult sites.

(Credit: ICM Registry)

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) board at its meeting Friday will consider a proposal from ICM Registry for adult sites to use the .xxx top-level domain instead of or in addition to .com.

This is hardly the first time ICANN has dealt with this issue. It rejected similar proposals in 2000, again in 2006 and most recently in 2007.

In an telephone interview Wednesday night from Nairobi (scroll down for podcast), ICM President Stuart Lawley said he successfully appealed the 2007 decision, paving the way for ICANN to reconsider the proposal on its merits.

The proposal has been a hot button for years, uniting some conservatives and some free-speech advocates in opposition to it. The conservative Family Research Council, for example, opposed the idea in a 2005 press release, arguing that "pornographers will be given even more opportunities to flood our homes, libraries, and society with pornography through the .xxx domain."

But the American Civil Liberties Union also had concerns. In 2004, ACLU's Barry Steinhardt told CNET's Declan McCullagh that "there are nations all over the world that will undoubtedly try to force Web sites into the .xxx (top-level domain) or to block Web sites in it that they somehow view as offensive." Steinhardt worried that "it will become a worldwide red-light district for the Internet, into which speakers who have free-expression rights and should be able to reach a mass audience will be forced." (Steinhardt has since retired from the ACLU and is now at the Stanford Center for Internet and Society.)

As an Internet safety advocate, my concern about .xxx is that it could give parents a false sense of security. True, it would be very easy to configure browsers or filters to automatically block sites designated as .xxx, but since this is a voluntary program, there would be nothing to stop adult site operators from also using .com. It would be like setting up a red-light district in a community while also allowing adult entertainment establishments to operate in residential shopping centers.

In our interview, Lawley responded to this concern: "It's not a great secret and everyone is aware that there is a lot of adult content on the Internet and...it was never my job or the job of .xxx to try to eradicate that." He expressed hope that "it would become the domain of choice for adult providers because of the benefits it would provide...The idea that this would be a universal panacea and cure-all for the issue adult content on the Web was never the intent."

Lawley called .xxx "an attempt at credible self-regulation by engaging with other impacted stake holders." He said that adult sites that use .xxx would be subject to "best business practices" that prohibition of child pornography and malicious software. It would also be "mandatory for .xxx sites to label their sites with machine readable tags. He called it a "win win win situation" for the adult entertainment providers, consumers of adult entertainment, and parents who wished to keep their kids away from adult content.

While I respect Lawley's sincerely, I'm still not convinced the .xxx is in the best interest of child protection or free speech. As Lawley admits, this isn't a panacea and, unfortunately, there are no other silver bullets when it comes to keeping kids from wandering into inappropriate online areas. Parents do have the option of installing content filters which are a lot better than they were when the idea for .xxx domains was first introduced, but even those are far from fool-proof. Until someone comes up with a better solution, my recommendation is that parents be with young children while they are online, check-in frequently with preteens and work with children of all ages--especially teenagers--to fine-tune that filter that runs between their ears.

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[DirtRidr]

The .XXX domains should be used but only when we are prepared to make it illegal and punishable to publish porn using any other domain extension.

[ZetaZeta_]

www.google.xxx/images since they'd lose their .com license, amirite?

[ColeSlaw82]

I don't see how you could make it illegal and punisable. What is porn? Hardcore stuff? Most people would agree that is porn. What about swimsuit magazines? What about car calendars with ladies on the hoods? What about the Paris Hilton hamburger commercial? Romance Novels?

You can't make it "illegal and punishable to publish porn using any other domain extension" until you have a legal definition of porn. Good luck with that.

[vikinzer]

I am slightly appalled not only at this comment, but that people like this comment. I would personally love to see a .xxx domain marker. I think that in general pornographers should keep to this top level domain, but I do not believe that they should be forced to. I am not above admiting I quite enjoy porn, and so does my partner. I also do not believe it should be easily available to young children, and it currently is. That access on the internet bothers me and always has. .XXX domains would be very easy to filter, and while this certainly wouldn't eliminate porn in .com locations it would likely reduce it some. I don't have kids yet, but if I ever do have kids I would want a way to reliably filter such content.

To the people out there that will come back and say that kids will find a way around such filters, I'm not worried about a technically savy 16 year old fighting their way past the filters and finding porn. That's just the modern version of sneaking a peek at dad's locked up playboys. It's nothing new. I'm concerned about the 8 year old accidentally stumbling across it while hitting up myspace.

[gefitz]

Laws on the internet ARE NOT ENFORCEABLE! Sweet merciful crap...when will people realize that the internet actually exists in other countries, where laws can differ? Where porn isn't taboo, because parents actually supervise their kids?

Having a .xxx domain serves NO purpose. Can we please stop spending time and money on this, and start teaching parents to supervise their own children's activity on the internet if this sort of thing causes them worry?

[Dalkorian]

Do you people drive your young children to unknown towns and simply drop them off on any unknown street corner, hoping your child will be able to remain safe but knowing there are "shady" characters about? Why not? That's what you're doing with the internet, you know.

Children shouldn't have computers hooked up to the internet in their bedrooms. Period. Doing so is exhibiting stupidity to a remarkably dangerous level. It's no different than dropping your kids off near prostitutes and crack dealers at midnight and leaving them to their own defenses. It borders on child abuse.

It is not my nor anyone else's responsibility to keep your children safe, it's yours. If you're not willing to do the work it takes to make that happen (example, keeping an eye on your kids while they surf the internet in the living room), then you should give them up for adoption and let someone else assume that responsibility.

[aphoog]

so why is not having a .xxx domain a better idea? Like it or not, pornography will be a part of the internet into the near future. Legitimate porn websites will have no problem if this domain comes with strings attached (prohibition of child porn, machine readable tags etc.). Means people who read porn today will be able to do so from "safe" sites. Less malware, better control on content, a little less evil in the world.

As far as the risk of children accessing porn is concerned plz read Parenting 101. Parents must be responsible for their childrens actions. There is no alternative to parental responsibility. Children will not be any more exposed to porn than they are today. You think kids dont know how to turn safe search off? and that pesky parental control? blocking at the router level? Your kids probably know the passwords of most systems (well maybe not the case for tech savvy parents among us...but still). I can tell you back in the 80s kids had access to porn (and there was no internet where I lived).

[Dalkorian]

It's pointless and will cause more problems that it solves, by a long shot. Example: define "porn". Be very careful, some kids have been using their cell phones to take nude photos of themselves for their friends, is that porn? What about vacation photos taken on a nude beach? My parents have pictures of themselves giving me a bath when I was still an infant, is that porn too (child porn in this case!)? What about the Sport Illustrated Swimsuit website, women often appear topless there (covering themselves with their arms or hands)?

Alright, let's pretend for a moment we were able to come up with a consensus as to what "porn" is (LOL). Do we require all porn sites to move over to a .xxx domain? Worldwide? How? Otherwise this is an exercise in futility at best, right? Creating the red light district by itself doesn't guarantee the prostitutes will go there, in fact they may set up shop there and still use their old street corner (consider what some countries will do with a red light district on the internet - ever hear of the Great Firewall of China??). So they get the best of both worlds (a known "red light district" to peddle their "wares" AND free reign in their old location) and you get twice as many sites to watch for (half of them in "known" locations). Real help that was.

The world is a messy and dangerous place. Your children shouldn't be running around loose in any part of it and the internet is NO EXCEPTION. Take responsibility for your own and stop trying to dump it on everyone else.

[monkeyfun14]

Yeah the family groups should be praising this idea not blasting it. It makes it more likely that porn will move off the .com domains and into a domain that is obviously pornography.

But of course they only have one though going through there mind when it comes to sex.

"Think of the children!!! What about the god damn children!!!"

Not realizing that this would do more help then hurt.

[cloudmatt]

.XXX is the solution, not perfect but darn close. The legitimate porn industry will jump right on it. The extension is little more than the sleazy neon sign outside of if the nondescript brick building. You go there you know what your getting and if your looking for it you know where it is. Sure mature images may linger in msg boards and on social media sites and what have you but there will still be some level reduction overall. I love porn and wish nothing bad for it but I also have to deal with filtering it from users and .XXX would do the trick nicely.

[gefitz]

Right. Because all porn providers are legit, they'll all play along, in all countries, and you'll just type in "*.xxx" into your firewall and never have to have your users see porn ever again.

Keep dreaming and wasting your time, I guess.

[Dalkorian]

It's more likely the porn sites will *ADD* new .XXX domains, not move over to them. Think about that for a few hours until you understand the problem.

I'm not necessarily against this .xxx domain idiocy, I just don't agree with the reasoning. It won't change ANYTHING except to open a known "red light district", another avenue for porn sites to thrive in. You can't force them all to move over to it, you can't even define what "porn" really is (everyone disagrees and all we end up with is making the Swimsuit Illustrated website illegal) but you have this feeling it's a good idea because some uneducated numbskull threw out some "think of the children" sound bytes and you're convinced doing something is always better than doing nothing, even when you have no idea what you're doing.

Nothing good can come of this, unless you are having difficulty finding porn on today's internet.

[cloudmatt]

@2 guys above
And you have a better plan? Do tell it'll probably make you very rich.