Should the Feds Pay to Modernize the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children’s CyberTipline? (S. 3170)

What is S. 3170?

(Updated December 17, 2018)

This bill — the CyberTipline Modernization Act of 2018 — would make numerous procedural changes to the process by which internet service providers (ISPs) report to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) on apparent violations of laws against the sexual exploitation of children. It would impose a mandate on ISPs that’d expand their duty to report violations of child pornography and sexual exploitation laws to NCMEC’s CyberTipline. The bill would broaden the type of content that must be reported to include all visual depictions of child pornography and any planned or imminent violations of related laws.

Argument in favor

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s CyberTipline is a powerful tool in the fight against child exploitation and trafficking, and it should be modernized to ensure that it remains useful to law enforcement. By imposing reporting duties on ISPs, this bill makes these providers responsible for reporting crimes happening on their networks.

Argument opposed

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s CyberTipline works fine — but the cataloging of tips and reports needs improvement in order to make CyberTipeline reports effective. Rather than spending money to modernize the tipline, it’d be more useful to establish better information-gathering and cataloging processes at NCMEC.

Impact

Exploited children; internet service providers; DOJ; NCMEC; and NCMEC CyberTipline.

Cost of S. 3170

The CBO estimates that implementing this bill would have no significant cost to the federal government, as it only makes procedural changes to reporting requirements for ISPs.

Additional Info

In-Depth: Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) introduced this bill to modernize NCMEC’s CyberTipline:

“The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children receives millions of reports to the CyberTipline annually, making it a critical part of their mission to protect children. However, in the twenty years since the tipline’s creation, online child exploitation has grown and morphed. This legislation will make much needed updates to ensure the CyberTipline and NCMEC can continue to prevent and stop exploitation of children online.”

The Internet Association supports this bill. Its Senior Vice President for Global Government Affairs, Melika Carroll, notes that the CyberTipline is in need of updates to ensure efforts to combat child exploitation are effective:

“The CyberTipline Modernization Act is important legislation that will help internet platforms combat the scourge of child exploitation online. The internet industry supports its passage. This bill provides essential updates to the CyberTipline, which enables coordination between NCMEC, the public, law enforcement, and the internet sector, as we all work together to eradicate child exploitation both online and offline.”

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) found in 2011 that the NCMEC CyberTipline itself was working well, but the cataloging and handoff of information for law enforcement was lacking:

“[A]ccording to many law enforcement officials GAO contacted, information in a CyberTipline report may not contain an image of apparent child pornography or may contain old data. NCMEC officials said that they are interested in obtaining additional feedback to enhance the usefulness of its reports and could explore additional methods to gather such information, such as creating a systematic process for obtaining feedback from federal law enforcement. Enhancing its processes for collecting feedback on the usefulness of CyberTipline reports could help NCMEC ensure that reports are as useful as possible to law enforcement.”

This bill passed the Senate with an amendment by a unanimous vote with the support of 12 Senate cosponsors, including six Democrats and six Republicans. It has the support of NCMEC, the National District Attorneys Association, the Internet Association, RAINN, and leaders in the technology industry.

Of Note: NCMEC has served as the national resource center for missing and exploited children since 1984, carrying out many of the Missing Children’s Assistance Act’s objectives in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ’s) Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP). NCMEC created the CyberTipline in 1998 to help prevent and stop the sexual exploitation of children.

The CyberTipline provides the public and the technology industry with the ability to report online (and via toll-free telephone) instances of child sexual exploitation including child pornography, online enticement of children for sexual acts, child sex tourism, and child sex trafficking. Reports and tips to the CyberTipline help law enforcement identify child victims and provide them with needed services. It also helps ensure that child pornography can be removed from the internet, making the internet safer for children.

The CyberTipline also allows NCMEC to engage with the Internet industry on voluntary initiatives to help reduce the proliferation of child sexual abuse images online. NCMEC uses the information submitted to the CyberTipline to create and tailor its safety and prevention publications for educators, parents, and the public.

Congress enacted legislation related to the CyberTipline in 2008, and hasn’t updated it since then.

Media:

• Sponsoring Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) Press Release

• CBO Cost Estimate

• NCMEC Twitter (In Support)

• Internet Association (In Support)

• GAO (Context)

• CRS (Context)