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The Twenty-Six Words That Created the Internet

Jeff Kosseff

4.28 · Rating details · 86 ratings · 13 reviews

As seen on CBS 60 Minutes

No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.

Did you know that these twenty-six words are responsible for much of America's multibillion-dollar online industry? What we can and cannot write, say, and do online is based on j ...more

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Hardcover, 328 pages

Published April 15th 2019 by Cornell University Press

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Jan 16, 2021 Rajiv Srinivasan rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I picked up this book after Donald Trump held hostage the Defense Authorization Bill in exchange for a repeal of Section 230 of the CDA. This is a little known statute with absolutely unbelievable consequence to our modern economy. There is now 25 years of case law that Jeff Kosseff outlines in brilliant form in this book. How can one law simultaneously encourage and promote the #metoo movement, protecting women as they protest against the most powerful men in society; protect the vile, racist, ...more

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Jan 02, 2020 Nicolaus Stengl rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: κυβερνήτης

An excellent legal, cultural, and historical analysis of a single sentence, one which is even more relevant today: “No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.”

Here we read about the obscenity laws of the 20th century, the early days of the Internet, and thus also the ways and means by which disinformation can be spread.

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Sep 05, 2020 John Hoole rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: free-speech

An opinionated and very useful primer on the history of section 230 of the Communications Decency Act - a law passed by Congress in 1996 that enabled the development of the modern internet by shielding service providers from being sued for the inaccurate, illegal, defamatory, stupid shit they provide as user-generated content. Kosseff summarizes that the law specifies "that companies will not be considered to be the speakers or publishers of third-party content, and they will not lose that prote An opinionated and very useful primer on the history of section 230 of the Communications Decency Act - a law passed by Congress in 1996 that enabled the development of the modern internet by shielding service providers from being sued for the inaccurate, illegal, defamatory, stupid shit they provide as user-generated content. Kosseff summarizes that the law specifies "that companies will not be considered to be the speakers or publishers of third-party content, and they will not lose that protection only because they delete objectionable posts or otherwise exercise good-faith efforts to moderate user content."

The book describes how section 230 has prevented innovative companies like Facebook, Yelp, Uber, and the rest from being smothered by a torrent of denial-of-service-like complaints that content is illegal (or actual lawsuits) that would have made them averse to the risk of facilitating the massive amounts of user-generated content that is the backbone of today's internet. The justification for this broad immunity, as described by one frequently-sued internet provider: “For any website that allows user-generated comments, investigating and verifying every posting would be economically and practically impossible, so the law (at least here in the United States) does not hold website operators responsible for the accuracy of material posted by a user.” You could come to the opposite conclusion that sites that are incapable of policing their content are undesirable and should be held accountable for that deficiency.

I object to the "only" in this sentence from Kossef's conclusion: "The only way to prevent illegal third-party content with any certainty—and avoid being sued out of oblivion—is to turn the Internet into a closed, one-way street that looks more like a broadcaster or newspaper and less like the Internet we know today." The very different path Europe is taking demonstrates that we can, and I hope will, imagine a rebalancing of section 230's prioritization of scale, public exposure, and unfettered expression, to better account for the values of community, privacy, security, and thoughtful communication. The last 10 years have convinced me that the massive scale of the social media giants, enabled by CDA 230, and the data collection and "communication" between users they enable has done more harm than good. ...more

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Jun 02, 2020 Jon rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Not sure what I was hoping for when I got this book, but it wasn't what I expected (not necessarily a bad thing). A detailed summary of how federal legal protection was provided to companies' web sites -- protecting them from content posted by others -- and how that created both a surge in internet use and a myriad of so-far unsolved problems. The book may be a little too exhaustive in outlining the relevant cases (all of this ended up in court). I could've used more concise summaries, especiall ...more

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Mar 19, 2020 Mike Warren rated it really liked it · review of another edition

The Internet has transformed our lives and upended American commerce. As it functions in the United States, the Internet is likely the greatest platform for free speech in the history of the world. Websites like Facebook and Twitter have changed, for better or worse, how we interact with each other, and digital marketplaces like Amazon, eBay and Spotify have put a remarkably wide range of products and services at our fingertips. None of this, argues Jeff Kosseff, would have been possible without The Internet has transformed our lives and upended American commerce. As it functions in the United States, the Internet is likely the greatest platform for free speech in the history of the world. Websites like Facebook and Twitter have changed, for better or worse, how we interact with each other, and digital marketplaces like Amazon, eBay and Spotify have put a remarkably wide range of products and services at our fingertips. None of this, argues Jeff Kosseff, would have been possible without a 26-word clause that was tucked into the federal Communications Decency Act (CDA) that was signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1996.

Section 230, the 26 words at the heart of Mr. Kosseff’s book, was little noticed when the CDA was passed in 1996. This somewhat obscure clause was overshadowed by the discussion of the full CDA, which was primarily focused on regulating online pornography. It didn’t take long, however, for ecommerce companies to learn and appreciate the significance of the broad immunity that Section 230 gave them against liability claims related to third-party content. Simply stated, without Section 230 the types of third-party content that has become commonplace on Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, and Amazon either wouldn’t exist, or it would be severely restricted. And this third-party content has become the backbone of the modern-day Internet. As Ms. Kosseff observes, most of the top ten websites in the U.S. rely either entirely or significantly on third-party content.

Section 230 was the brainchild of two Congressman, one Republican and one Democrat, who were concerned about the potential for a recent court decision to stifle the free-speech potential of the Internet. In the mid-90s, partisanship in Congress had reached the point that Democrats and Republicans refused to sit at the same tables in the Congressional dining hall, but Chris Cox, a House Republican from California and Ron Wyden, a House Democrat from Oregon, were an exception. Cox would go on to head the SEC under President George W. Bush, and Wyden now serves as the senior Senator from Oregon, but it is their role in developing and championing Section 230 that will likely stand as their most significant contribution to U.S. statesmanship.

Both men were concerned about a court ruling that had been issued in May of 1995 in a case known as Stratton Oakmont v. Prodigy. In that case, Daniel Porush, the president of the Stratton Oakmont brokerage firm, sued Prodigy, one of the earliest online services, for defamatory information that had been posted about him and Stratton Oakmont by a third-party user on one of Prodigy’s chat forums. Even though Prodigy was little more than a neutral intermediary, they had made marketing claims that they moderated their chat forums. Using this attempt at moderation as its cudgel, the court ruled in favor of Porush and Stratton Oakmont.

Cox and Wyden were concerned about the “chilling effect” this ruling could have on the Internet’s ability to become a functional and open forum for free speech. They felt it was good public policy to encourage companies that operated online forums to moderate their user content, but the Stratton Oakmont decision demonstrated that, unless these companies were able to achieve an arbitrary and unreasonable standard of content moderation, they could be punished for their failures, which offered a perverse incentive for companies to take a completely hands-off approach to user content. The CDA was already working its way through Congress, and they saw an opportunity to insert what would become Section 230 into the legislation.

Surprisingly, Section 230 was drafted and passed with very little input from the tech industry. Companies like Google and Facebook now have an army of lobbyists roaming the corridors of Congress, but the legislation that enabled their business models and made them the companies they are today became law almost entirely through the work of a group of people who wanted nothing more than to allow the Internet to achieve its latent potential as a robust and open forum for the exchange of ideas.

The book is divided into four sections: the creation of Section 230, the rise of Section 230, the gradual erosion of Section 230 and the future of Section 230. The story is mostly told through the court cases that shaped and defined Section 230, and these vignettes make the book seem like a series of interconnected short stories. The author does a good job of making legal principles and issues accessible to a general audience, but he doesn’t have much of a flair for storytelling. The book is informative, but the prose is somewhat dry. Much of this book reads like a law-school textbook.

The author does an outstanding job of remaining neutral about his topic. He admits that he is a fan and advocate of Section 230, but he fully understands and articulates the problems with Section 230. Many companies have used this law to shield them from negligent and egregious behavior. The victims in these lawsuits frequently suffer real and serious damages. Reputations and livelihoods have been ruined, and, in many cases, it is clear the defendants could have done more to prevent these damages. Yet, the broad immunity of Section 230 effectively gives them a get-out-of-jail-free card, and the author doesn’t pull any punches in his criticism of how Section 230 sometimes allows bad things to happen to innocent people.

Ultimately, however, this is a feel-good story. It explains how a bipartisan Congress created legislation that allowed a nascent industry to flourish and provided U.S. citizens with the full benefits of the internet. Jeff Kosseff has written a well-reasoned, informative book that helps us to appreciate how well our system can work when it functions as it should. ...more

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Aug 16, 2020 Kappner C. Boles rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Great history of liability limitations on the internet

I learned a great deal about the history of legal battles around limiting liability for internet platforms. The book presents a balanced view of the many implications that any particular policy choice might generate. There is no path that does not create some unfairness or other negative consequences and I now have a better understanding of these trade offs.

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Jul 03, 2020 Kevin Jennings added it · review of another edition

This was a great review of the Section 230 part of the law the governs the internet. It basically explains why exists, what its implications are and what are its limits. Really great if you are interested in what "free speech" on the internet means. Literal Goodreads could not exist without Section 230 and I wouldn't be writing any reviews anywhere on the internet without it either. ...more

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Aug 11, 2020 Geoff rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Extremely thoroughly researched and very interesting book about Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, told through First Amendment decisions prior to its enactment and the various legal challenges to the law over time. I would have loved a bit more opinion on the future of the law, but what's there is very good and appropriately nuanced in its presentation. ...more

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Jan 02, 2021 Marc F. rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This is an excellent biography of Section 230 documenting the origin, impact and implications beyond the mass media sound bites. Take the time to read this, especially if you want to advocate a position. Be educated before you exercise your American right if “Free Speech”.

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Jun 21, 2020 Jacob Mainwaring rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I didn’t finish but was able to get the main takeaway. The book goes into great detail about the history and future of section 230 of the communications decency act, which regards internet platforms as distributors, rather than publishers, of content. In other words, they are seen more as phone companies than as newspapers, which means they are not liable for the information posted on their sites. The goal of this clause was to encourage platforms to moderate and remove objectionable/obscene con ...more

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Jan 02, 2020 Riley Holmes rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Interesting exposition of various important court cases related to freedom of speech and liability in the early days of the internet.

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Apr 19, 2019 Rt rated it really liked it

A history of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects website owners from liability from stuff that their users post. (Intellectual property claims, child porn, and violations of federal criminal laws are not covered by 230.) Kosseff traces the legal background in the US that produced the perceived need for 230—courts had started to suggest that websites could be liable for user-supplied content if they enforced content policies but missed a particular bad post, but not if t A history of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects website owners from liability from stuff that their users post. (Intellectual property claims, child porn, and violations of federal criminal laws are not covered by 230.) Kosseff traces the legal background in the US that produced the perceived need for 230—courts had started to suggest that websites could be liable for user-supplied content if they enforced content policies but missed a particular bad post, but not if they didn’t check content at all, giving them an incentive to be completely hands-off. Congress wanted to encourage sites to monitor instead of having a free-for-all. 230 passed as part of an overall attempt to get porn offline, and Kosseff points out that 230 only made it in as a compromise with the porn-regulators; after the porn regulations in the CDA were struck down, only 230 remained, and it made American companies unstoppable in terms of what they were willing to experiment with, for good and ill.

Kosseff tracks the early breadth of 230 cases, protecting site operators against liability for user-supplied defamation and also blocking causes of action that tried to dodge 230 by pleading that the legal violation at issue wasn’t based on users’ content. (It usually was.) Over time, however, litigants have figured out some paths that occasionally work, based on theories such as a breach of a promise from the site operator or the operator’s involvement in developing or enhancing specifically illegal content. It’s a good overview.

I have some serious disagreements with how Kosseff approaches the recent modification of 230 to create more liability for involvement in sex trafficking—begun under Obama but signed into law by Trump. The problem was Backpage, and Kosseff highlights horrible stories of girls who were coerced and raped and whose profiles appeared on Backpage. “Viewing the reports in the most charitable light, it is clear that Backpage knew that its users were posting sex trafficking ads, yet it failed to take all possible steps to stop them.” But litigation against Backpage seemed stalled, in part because the litigants used bad theories/didn’t have the strongest evidence that came out later. Kosseff criticizes the major internet companies for testifying that these stories were bad, but that modifying 230 would “create a new wave of frivolous and unpredictable actions against legitimate companies rather than addressing underlying criminal behavior.” He says: “Such a statement might be appropriate for, say, data security legislation. But this is about children being raped and murdered.” I find this response close to immoral itself: when Trump talks about immigrants being rapists, or when homophobes do the same with bathroom bills, we do not say “you can’t trivialize rape by saying our solution is wrong!” Targeting internet services is not discriminatory, but it’s also not a good idea, and I think we should get to point that out.

Indeed, Kosseff himself says “[e]ven if public sites such as Backpage were shut down, I have no doubt that the pimps would continue to shift to the darker corners of the web.” But he’s still “appalled by the technology companies’ general approach to the issue” because they didn’t “provide viable alternative solutions that would allow states to prosecute and victims to sue the websites that knew about, encouraged, or even participated in the sale of children for sex.” This is so even though he believed that Backpage’s specific actions deprived it of 230 immunity because it participated in the development of trafficking posts specifically; he just thought “we can’t wait for the courts to get it right.”

But… he doesn’t like the law that was ultimately adopted, because it’s overbroad and threatens services with liability even if they didn’t specifically know about particular instances of trafficking. Which is exactly what the services were saying. Worse, as he points out, the law had no impact on Backpage itself, because it was promptly shut down for violating federal criminal law based on pre-amendment law. The change was thus unnecessary to get Backpage, but it did succeed in shutting down Craigslist personals and making it incredibly risky to operate any service for voluntary sex workers. There’s not a word in the book about sex workers’ concerns about losing the ability to screen clients and avoid unsafe situations on the street if online venues shuttered—even though those predictions do seem to have come true.

So by Kosseff’s own account, (1) changing 230 wasn’t necessary, (2) changing 230 won’t work against dedicated traffickers, and (3) the change “is ambiguous and overbroad and leaves well-intentioned platforms with the choice of censoring legitimate speech or risking lawsuits and criminal prosecution,” but it’s still (4) it’s services’ own fault because they didn’t take victims seriously enough. As we’ve seen with other disputes over content regulation online, if you’re not perfect, you can’t escape criticism, and at internet scale it’s impossible to be perfect. American free speech exceptionalism is not always a good thing, but it often looks a lot better than the alternatives, especially with a litigation culture that leads us to sue more—and ask for and get bigger damage awards than are available in other countries, which is an underappreciated part of the stakes in the US—than people do in other countries. ...more

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