New bill requires file-sharing software to get parental consent because of porn

Besides requiring parental consent, the bill would allow parents to install "beacons" on their computers that signal their desire to not have file-sharing software. If a child tries to download the software, networks would have to refuse when they see the beacon. The beacons would be developed by the Federal Trade Commission with assistance from the Commerce Department.

It also would require file-sharing networks to warn users about the dangers of file sharing. Several studies have shown that the networks are rife with pornography.

Morpheus, Kazaa and other services have attained notoriety in the past several years for allowing widespread music swapping, but they can be used to trade documents, images, videos and any other kind of digital file. A recent study by Ames, Iowa-based Internet security firm Palisade Systems found that users of the Gnutella file-sharing network searched for pornography more often than they searched for music.

Pitts drafted the bill after reading a General Accounting Office (GAO) study showing the high availability of pornography on file-sharing networks, said spokesman Derek Karchner. GAO investigators in a test of the Kazaa network entered search terms including Pokemon, Britney Spears and Olsen Twins. More than 40 percent of the returns for those searches yielded child pornography, and another 30 percent returned adult pornography.