Adam4Adam

The never-enforced law was Congress' second attempt to protect children from online porn. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld in 2004 a temporary injunction blocking the law from taking effect; Reed on Thursday issued a permanent injunction.

The law would have criminalized Web sites that allow children to access material deemed "harmful to minors" by "contemporary community standards." The sites would have been expected to require a credit card number or other proof of age.

Gay & Lesbian News reports that Adam4Adam and similar sites may soon come under an expanded interpretation of 18 U.S.C. 2257, the Child Protection and Obscenity Enforcement Act and wrote:

anyone with a sexually explicit picture on a site like Adam4Adam.com could be considered a secondary producer if the new regulations go into effect, and would be subject to the same type of requirements that the adult Web sites would be under.

If successfully applied, these regulations would mean that Adam4Adam and similar companies would have to keep records proving that individuals appearing in photographs or videos are over the age of 18. They would also have to "categorize those documents in a meticulous manner", with failure to comply resulting in possible felony charges and prison time.

An attorney for the Free Speech Coalition noted:

It's just a series of land mines designed to trap the unwary [...] if you file it wrong, if you put it in [the] wrong alphabetical order [...] you're facing federal prosecution on a first offense with a maximum of five years, [and] a secondary offense [with] a minimum of two years. It's just insane.

Further, not only the company but the website's members could be responsible under these same regulations. The same lawyer remarked that if he had a profile on Adam4Adam this would mean:

I would have to have a photocopy of my own ID and a list in my home ready for federal inspection, a paper with my legal name, or any name I have ever used under any circumstances [...] the form of ID I provided to myself, the serial number of that ID and [would have to have it] signed under penalty of perjury. If I don't have that document or a photo of my ID available 20 hours a week for federal inspection, I've committed a felony.