The EARN IT Act [is] a bill designed to confront the explosion of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) online. EARN IT would help address what is, disturbingly, a common experience for young users: routine exposure to predatory targeting, grooming, sexual violence, prostitution/sex trafficking, hardcore pornography and more. A New York Times investigation revealed that 70 million CSAM images were reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) in 2019"up from 600,000 in 2008"an "almost unfathomable" increase in criminality. The EARN IT Act restores privacy to victims of child sexual abuse material and allows them to sueâ€those who cause them harm online, under federal civil law and state criminal and civil law. It also creates a new commission to issue guidelines to limit sex trafficking, grooming and sexual exploitationâ€online. CSAM still exists because tech platforms have no incentive to prevent or eliminate it, because Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (passed in 1996, before social media existed) gives them near-blanket immunity from liability. While some in the technology sector [are] claiming EARN IT is a threat to encryption and user privacy, the reality is that encryption can coexist with better business practices for online child safety. We can increase security and privacy while refraining from a privacy-absolutism that unintentionally allows sexual predators to run rampant online.
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