Media Contact:
Benjamin Arden, (202) 418-0288 
benjamin.arden@fcc.gov 






FCC COMMISSIONER CARR WELCOMES EXECUTIVE ORDER ON ONLINE CENSORSHIP

WASHINGTON, DC, May 28, 2020—Today, President Donald J. Trump issued an Executive Order addressing online censorship.  The Executive Order directs the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to file a petition for rulemaking with the FCC seeking clarification regarding the meaning of provisions contained in Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, among other steps.

FCC Commissioner Carr issued the following statement:

“Every speaker in this country has a First Amendment right to free speech.  Above and beyond those constitutional guarantees, Congress decided in the 1990s to confer a special and unique set of liability and legal privileges on one set of actors, which it defined as ‘providers of interactive computer services’ in a statutory provision known as Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.

“Congress took that step to empower parents to protect their children from material on Internet sites like the then-popular Prodigy messaging board.  And it acted to protect the ‘good faith’ steps taken by those computer services providers.  Flash forward over 20 years, and today’s Internet giants and social media companies now benefit from those Section 230 protections when other speakers do not.  Yet the federal government has provided virtually no guidance on the ‘good faith’ limitation Congress included in Section 230.

“I welcome today’s Executive Order and its call for guidance on the scope of the unique and conditional set of legal privileges that Congress conferred on social media companies but no other set of speakers in Section 230.  I look forward to receiving the petition that the NTIA files.”

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Office of Commissioner Brendan Carr: (202) 418-2200
www.fcc.gov/about/leadership/brendan-carr