Optenet Releases WOLF to Block Illegal Web Site Access

The Child Online Protection Act (COPA) was a U.S. law passed in 1998 that restricted access by minors to any Internet-accessed material defined as “harmful” to them. COPA rose as an attempt by U.S. lawmakers to fill the vacuum left by earlier, broader, Communications Decency Act that the U.S. Supreme Court had struck down as unconstitutional.

 

In an effort to survive legally, COPA was limited to commercial speech and providers based within the U.S. However, in a case brought against it in 2007 by the ACLU and others, U.S. District Judge Lowell A. Reed, Jr. struck down the law, finding it facially in violation of the First and Fifth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. The government appealed to the Third Circuit, but on July 22, 2008, the Third U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the 2007 decision. On January 21, 2009, the United States Supreme Court refused to hear appeals of the lower court decision, thus effectively killing the bill.

 

This leaves the matter of who – if not the Federal government (thank goodness) — can now block access to illegal or “disturbing” content.

 

Interestingly, just on the heels of the recent Supreme Court ruling (or lack thereof, actually) that effectively hammered the latest nail into the coffin of COPA, Optenet — a company founded over a decade ago in Spain as an Internet Service Provider and now a global IT security company dedicated to protecting children online that offers content filtering solutions – has announced the immediate availability of a new cost-effective and easy-to-deploy appliance called WOLF that enables service providers to block access to known illegal and illicit Web sites. WOLF can be quickly added to a provider’s network, serving as a major initial step toward complete Web security.

 

In response to growing worldwide pressure to hold service providers responsible for the content traveling over their networks, WOLF is an advanced Web filtering product which utilizes internationally accepted lists from various organizations and government bodies to enable service providers to identify and block websites that have been categorized as illegal (e.g. child pornography, human trafficking, etc.). Filtering these sites at the network level can help service providers comply with pressure from international communities to eliminate access to illegal content and provide customers with a more secure online experience.

 

Using lists from various organizations and government bodies such as the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) and the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), WOLF checks all Web access requests against a combination of lists containing illegal sites and blocks access as necessary. It is a highly flexible solution that allows additional blacklists to be added as the need arises or future regulations dictate.

 

WOLF is designed to meet the current international standards being established by countries like France, England and Australia and is flexible enough to support future legal and regulatory requirements as well as voluntary responsibility efforts. Service providers can utilize WOLF to identify what they deem as unacceptable sites, meet regulations, offer parents assurance that children are not exposed to the worst-of-the-worst Internet content and protect all end users from inadvertent access to potentially harmful content.

 

WOLF is the latest chapter in Optenet’s ongoing effort to protect children from illegal, dangerous or inappropriate content on the Internet. This commitment is made evident through specific Optenet products, as well as through support of government agencies and non-profit organizations who share this mission. Optenet is an active member of several Internet anti-abuse organizations such as the Internet Watch Foundation and the In-Hope network, and has funded Protegeles a not-for-profit organization, dedicated to the protection of minors.