Financial Times, 2 Feb 1996 Governments around the world are taking action to police computer networks By Our Foreign Staff The US Congress last night passed legislation that imposes stiff penalties for the distribution of "indecent" material on the Internet, a global web of computer networks that can be reached by an estimated 30m computer users. The action echoes moves by other leading industrial countries to bring the Internet under some form of control. It coincides with a call by French officials for an international law on communications to deal with regulation of electronic publishing on the Net. In Japan, meanwhile, Tokyo police have made what are believed to be the first arrests in a crackdown on the distribution of pornography via computer networks. The rapid growth of the Internet has created widespread concerns about its use to distribute pornography, racial hate messages and other offensive materials. However the vast bulk of material published on the global computer network is commercial or technical in nature. The measures passed in the US Congress, which were attached to a broad Telecommunications Bill, for the first time place legal limits on the types of materials that can be distributed via computer networks. Government intervention is strongly opposed by Internet pioneers, and by many within the computer industry, who believe that rapid growth of the Internet and electronic commerce will be stunted by regulation. Moreover, legal experts say that the regulation of cyberspace raises complex issues about jurisdiction because the Internet carries information across national borders. In France, the issue has been brought to a head by the recent publication, on the Internet, of "Le Grand Secret" (The Big Secret), a book about Francois Mitterrand's battle with cancer written by Dr Claude Gubler, the late president's personal physician, which has been banned by the French courts. Mr Francois Fillon, post and telecoms minister, said in the French Senate yesterday that he was to propose to a March meeting of EU culture and telecoms ministers an international conference to debate a law. He said the government was creating a working group with representatives from the ministries of justice, culture and telecoms, and stressed that his concerns included the problem of dealing with regulation outside national boundaries and the difficulty of pursuing those who abused the system. He also suggested the possibility of introducing ethical codes for Internet operators along the lines of those already in place for the country's Minitel telephone- based information system. In Japan, where use of the Internet is growing rapidly, the legality of publishing pornography on computer networks is about to be tested in the courts following the first arrests for allegedly criminal use of the Internet. Tokyo police announced that they had arrested a 28-year-old businessman, Mr Hiroshi Kamekura, on suspicion of distributing pornographic pictures. He is alleged to have produced the images at home and distributed them on his home page since last month, said police. According to Mr Kamekura, the service was popular and he was asked by other Internet users to produce more provocative pictures. Police also arrested a high school student, accused of distributing pornographic pictures over the Internet since last September. The arrests may raise eyebrows in a country where graphic, frequently sadistic pornography, moderated only by a ban on depictions of pubic hair, is openly sold on book stalls everywhere. A German court has already acted to prevent users in that country from accessing sexually explicit Internet discussion groups. The court forced Compuserve, a US-based online information service, to block access to about 200 of the thousands of "Usenet" groups to be found on the Internet. -----