Maybe It’s Time for a ‘Child Porn Czar’

Writing critically about child pornography and Internet related issues makes any columnist twitchy. Words must be precise, ideas and intent clear, and even then such writing is more like tap dancing through a minefield than it is an editorial undertaking. As a result, the subject of child pornography and those chosen to police it are given little journalistic scrutiny.

Enter Christopher Soghoian, a columnist for CNet who writes the “Surveillance State” blog. Soghoian has stepped up to the plate and taken on what he calls an Internet “sacred cow,” the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC).

Soghoian’s column says it’s time to appoint a “child pornography czar” able to step in and “take over the tasks currently performed by the powerful yet oversight-free organization” known as NCMEC.

You most likely know NCMEC as the organization responsible for the (brilliant) missing child campaign that puts images of kids on milk cartons. But they are so much more, Soghoian writes:

NCMEC was created by a congressional mandate in 1984, and coordinates the the efforts of law enforcement personnel, social service agency staff, elected officials, judges, prosecutors, educators, and elements of both the public and private sector to fight against all forms of child exploitation.

While NCMEC was created by Congress, is mostly funded by the U.S. government (and in particular, the Department of Justice), and plays a key role in assisting the FBI in its fight against child pornography, the organization isn’t part of the U.S. government. It is, instead, a nonprofit, and thus not subject to the Freedom of Information Act, the Privacy Act, or limited by constitutional protections guaranteeing free speech, due process, and freedom from unreasonable search and seizure.

Unchecked and operating with only shadowy oversight, NCMEC’s quasi-law enforcement portfolio rightly concerns Soghoian; it’s something that concerns CDT as well. “We have very significant concerns about the outsourcing of prosecutorial and investigative functions to a non-government entity,” says John Morris, CDT’s general counsel, as quoted by Soghoian in his column. “And we believe that those functions should only be done (by those subject to) the First and Fourth Amendments, the Privacy Act, and The Freedom Of Information Act,” Morris said.

Enter the “Child Porn Czar.” NCMEC’s job is just too important to be made to operate without accountable oversight, Soghoian says. “Nationalize NCMEC, make all of its workers federal employees, with good health care and job security, and perhaps even expand its budget–after all, it does good work, right?” Soghoian says. That move would, of course, make the organization fully responsive to Freedom of Information Act requests.

Drug czar, Intelligence Czar, and a “Car Czar” in the offing. Is a “Child Porn Czar” in our future, too?