Return to Transcripts main page
Live From...
Bush Signs Law Creating Internet Domain for Children
Aired December 04, 2002 - 13:42 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: It was a bill inspired by the death a sixth-grader at hands, police say, of a man she met over the Internet. Today, President Bush signed it into law, effectively creating a whole new Internet domain exclusively for children under 13.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: All of us here today share the same goals. We must give our nation's children every opportunity to grow in knowledge without undermining their character. We must give parents effective tools to help their children learn. And we must be on the side of our parents, as they work hard to raise their children.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Our technology correspondent Daniel Sieberg now joins us to tell us more about this.
Daniel, let's talk about the word "domain" and what this means to us now?
DANIEL SIEBERG, CNN TECHNOLOGY CORRESPONDENT: Sure, Kyra, just to give people a little bit of technical background in all of this, a domain name, people are familiar with dot-com, dot-net, dot-org, dot- gov. The idea behind a domain name is it gives people a place to go. It helps steer to you an Internet address. It also explains a little bit about what you can come to expect when you go to that site.
We see them here -- we see dot-com, dot-org, dot-gov, and dot-us. And this is the key to this story: Dot-us went live on the Internet about April this year. A company called NeuStar operates the domain name. It is overseen by the Department of Commerce. It's a little bit different because it is solely based on the U.S. government as an oversight body. You can see that it was created by Congress.
Now the control -- the dot-kids-dot-us is sort of a subdomain of dot-us. That makes it a little bit different than those other ones. And the content on it is meant for kids 13 and under for this dot- kids-dot-us name.
It also stipulates some of guidelines in terms of the content that will not be seen on this dot-kids-dot-us. Corner of the Internet. You see here that it's restricting references to sex, violence, drugs or alcohol, and no mention of the seven rude words as defined by the FCC, which we can't even mention on air. But that is the essence of this story. In technical terms, the domain name in this case being dot-kids-dot-us, and it's technically called a subdomain, for people.
PHILLIPS: So how is it going to be policed?
SIEBERG: That's a very good question, Kyra, because NeuStar, the company that does operate this, are the ones who will be actually policing the content on it. They're saying that it's designed for kids under 13, so it'll be kid-friendly sites.
But they will have to monitor it a couple of different ways. We spoke with them, and they said they will be doing it automated as well as people literally going through these pages and trying to find sites out there that either have this harmful content and shouldn't tent or are finding sites that don't belong there, in a sense.
So they will be responsible for policing it. They will report to the Department of Commerce with anything that they find, providing them with progress reports.
PHILLIPS: This all sounds great, but still, this can be a magnet for predators, right?
SIEBERG: Exactly, Kyra. That is what are we talking about here. Proponents of it say, Great, we're carving out this little corner on the Internet where there are these kid-friendly sites with information that's OK for kids under 13 -- that's great. On the other hand, critics are saying, Look, this is going to just tell all of predators and pedophiles exactly where kids may be going. Of course, the company that runs it, NeuStar, is going to be trying to make it secure, make it not able to be hacked, so the content on there won't be inappropriate for the children under the age of 13. But they admit it is going to be a challenge. They say they are up to it, that they are going to be policing it as stringently as possible and trying to keep any inappropriate content off there.
PHILLIPS: We'll look forward in 2003. Daniel Sieberg, thank you so much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired December 4, 2002 - 13:42 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: It was a bill inspired by the death a sixth-grader at hands, police say, of a man she met over the Internet. Today, President Bush signed it into law, effectively creating a whole new Internet domain exclusively for children under 13.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: All of us here today share the same goals. We must give our nation's children every opportunity to grow in knowledge without undermining their character. We must give parents effective tools to help their children learn. And we must be on the side of our parents, as they work hard to raise their children.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PHILLIPS: Our technology correspondent Daniel Sieberg now joins us to tell us more about this.
Daniel, let's talk about the word "domain" and what this means to us now?
DANIEL SIEBERG, CNN TECHNOLOGY CORRESPONDENT: Sure, Kyra, just to give people a little bit of technical background in all of this, a domain name, people are familiar with dot-com, dot-net, dot-org, dot- gov. The idea behind a domain name is it gives people a place to go. It helps steer to you an Internet address. It also explains a little bit about what you can come to expect when you go to that site.
We see them here -- we see dot-com, dot-org, dot-gov, and dot-us. And this is the key to this story: Dot-us went live on the Internet about April this year. A company called NeuStar operates the domain name. It is overseen by the Department of Commerce. It's a little bit different because it is solely based on the U.S. government as an oversight body. You can see that it was created by Congress.
Now the control -- the dot-kids-dot-us is sort of a subdomain of dot-us. That makes it a little bit different than those other ones. And the content on it is meant for kids 13 and under for this dot- kids-dot-us name.
It also stipulates some of guidelines in terms of the content that will not be seen on this dot-kids-dot-us. Corner of the Internet. You see here that it's restricting references to sex, violence, drugs or alcohol, and no mention of the seven rude words as defined by the FCC, which we can't even mention on air. But that is the essence of this story. In technical terms, the domain name in this case being dot-kids-dot-us, and it's technically called a subdomain, for people.
PHILLIPS: So how is it going to be policed?
SIEBERG: That's a very good question, Kyra, because NeuStar, the company that does operate this, are the ones who will be actually policing the content on it. They're saying that it's designed for kids under 13, so it'll be kid-friendly sites.
But they will have to monitor it a couple of different ways. We spoke with them, and they said they will be doing it automated as well as people literally going through these pages and trying to find sites out there that either have this harmful content and shouldn't tent or are finding sites that don't belong there, in a sense.
So they will be responsible for policing it. They will report to the Department of Commerce with anything that they find, providing them with progress reports.
PHILLIPS: This all sounds great, but still, this can be a magnet for predators, right?
SIEBERG: Exactly, Kyra. That is what are we talking about here. Proponents of it say, Great, we're carving out this little corner on the Internet where there are these kid-friendly sites with information that's OK for kids under 13 -- that's great. On the other hand, critics are saying, Look, this is going to just tell all of predators and pedophiles exactly where kids may be going. Of course, the company that runs it, NeuStar, is going to be trying to make it secure, make it not able to be hacked, so the content on there won't be inappropriate for the children under the age of 13. But they admit it is going to be a challenge. They say they are up to it, that they are going to be policing it as stringently as possible and trying to keep any inappropriate content off there.
PHILLIPS: We'll look forward in 2003. Daniel Sieberg, thank you so much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
