Has Verizon Forfeited Common Carrier Status?

An anonymous reader writes, "Freedom of speech, the future of the Net, you name it. In October, a U.S. vigilante group asked Verizon to cut off Net access to Epifora, a Canadian ISP that hosts a number of (entirely legal) web sites offering support to minor-attracted adults. Shortly thereafter, Verizon gave 30 days notice to Epifora, ending a 5 year relationship. Telecos have traditionally refrained from censoring legal content, arguing that as 'common carriers' it is outside of their scope to make such decisions. Furthermore, they have refrained because if they did so in some cases, they might be legally liable for other cases where they did not exercise censorship. The questions are: has Verizon forfeited their claim to common-carrier status by selectively censoring legal speech that they do not like? And can the net effectively route around censorship if the trunk carriers are allowed to pick and choose whom they allow to connect?"

Comments

A Team of Lawyers

[diersing]

Done. Every carrier will need a team of lawyers to review all content and deem it's legality.

Next

Re:Has Slashdot been duped?

[eln]

Actually, it's a typo. The submitter meant "miner-attracted adults." It's a group of people irresistibly drawn to hard hats and black lung disease. Just goes to show you can find a website for anything on the Internet.

Re:Possibly NSFW?

[fahrbot-bot]

I'm not too keen on gay shirtless men popping up on my monitor as I eat my lunch. My Christian coworker might think odd things of me.

Or, he may not :-)