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Information Highway Parental Empowerment Group.

From: boutell@netcom.com (Thomas Boutell)
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.www.announce,misc.activism.progressive
Subject: Internet Parental Empowerment Group Formed
Date: 15 Jun 1995 00:10:12 GMT

Three leading Internet software companies announced plans today to lead an industry-wide effort to create and implement standards that will enable parents, educators, and other adults to "lock out" access to inappropriate materials. The companies are: Microsoft Corporation; Netscape Communications, makers of the popular Netscape Navigator software; and Progressive Networks, makers of the RealAudio audio-on-demand system for the Internet. The joint effort, called the Information Highway Parental Empowerment Group, is focused on implementing an effective and easy-to-use system designed to meet the following goals:

1. The system would enable parents to ensure that their children do not unwittingly gain access to materials that the parent would deem inappropriate;
2. The system would make it easy for both content providers and third party rating services to characterize Internet content using whatever criteria they deemed appropriate;
3. The system could be implemented efficiently and would be designed in such a way that maximizes the likelihood that it will quickly become a standard part of Internet access systems.

"Clearly, as the Internet has grown, it's become increasingly important to give parents and educators the ability to control what children under their supervision can see and hear on the Net," said Mike Homer, Vice President of Marketing for Netscape Communications.

"Fortunately, advances in software technology will soon make it possible for us to design easy-to-use parental filtering capabilities directly into Netscape software. We look forward to working with the industry to ensure that these capabilities become pervasive."

"Microsoft thinks it's very important to help parents make the Internet a safe place for their children," said John Ludwig, general manager, Personal Systems Division, at Microsoft. "We intend to play a leading role in ensuring that this happens. Moreover, we remain committed to enabling parents to use the Microsoft Network, from the day it ships, in a way that is family-friendly."

The three founding members of the Information Highway Parental Empowerment Group invite other industry companies to join their effort. People requesting more information should contact IHPEG@prognet.com. The Group has agreed to issue a report by December 31st, 1995 which will analyze the myriad issues associated with integrating parental lock-out capabilities into Internet access software and provide concrete recommendations. The members of the study group anticipate being able to incorporate the recommendations into their software products during 1996.

"As the Internet becomes a multimedia place, the social issues associated with access to Internet programming become more important and more complicated," said Rob Glaser, President and CEO of Progressive Networks and chair of the study group. "We hope to move as quickly as possible to make our way through the issues so that we can come up with a stable and reliable technical solution to the legitimate issues that have been raised."

For more information on the Parental Empowerment Group, see: http://www.realaudio.com/contentp/rabest/IHPEG.html

For more information on stopping the Exon/Gorton Communications Decency Act, a NON-VOLUNTARY Internet censorship bill, see: http://www.realaudio.com/contentp/rabest/stop.exon.html