At issue is an application .xxx-domain owner ICM Registry has made to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers for approval of three additional pornography domains: .sex, .porn and .adult.
Morality in Media is asking the public to block approval of these domains that would only increase the number of porn sites on the Internet proven harmful to children, adults and families.
"What we need to do is overwhelm the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers with complaints about the new porn domains so that it calls attention to the problem with them and the fact that we don't need more porn on the Internet, which is all this will be," said Patrick Trueman, Morality in Media president and former chief of the U.S. Department of Justice's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section. "We are working today, in fact, on our current campaign to get organizations and individuals to file objections to these new domains, .sex, .adult and .porn."
MIM is contacting such groups as Focus on the Family, the Family Research Council, the Alliance Defending Freedom and others and has posted on its website www.pornharms.com, a petition gathering signatures against IMC Registry's application.
The public has until Aug. 12 to file complaints with ICANN, an international agency.
"This is a winnable issue," Trueman said. "And what ICANN wants to know and what ICM Registry has to demonstrate is that these new domains, these new porn domains, are in the public interest. So let's show that it's not, by just filing a complaint."
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ICM Registry promoted the .xxx domain as a vehicle for porn sites to leave the established .com portal. Instead, the new portal only proliferated new sites.
In the seven months since the .xxx domain went online, more than 215,000 new sites have registered under the domain, according to ICM Registry statistics, adding to numerous sites already active. Concurrently, ICM has made millions of dollars by selling programs to companies seeking to protect their names from association with the .xxx domain, which Trueman said was a calculated cash cow.
"Many of those that bought protection from ICM Registry paid thousands of dollars to assure that their good name would not be attached to a porn site on .xxx, but they did not know that ICM planned to roll out more and more porn-related domains," Trueman said. "ICM Registry stands to make untold millions of dollars from additional porn-related domains, but one has to wonder what new porn domains ICM will propose next year."
Filing a complaint with ICANN requires registration on the ICANN website, which Trueman described as a ploy to discourage participation. The process takes about five minutes.
"Keep in mind ICM Registry is going to try to get people to file supporting comments for this, as though we need more porn. There's always a lot of people supporting that position," Trueman said. "So we can win it if we get the people."
He encourages the public to file complaints at www.waronillegalpornography.com.
"America is already suffering an untreated pandemic of harm from pornography and we need less, not more, pornography," Trueman said. "Research demonstrates that harms from pornography include damage to brain function, lifelong addictions for both children and adults, isolation and depression, family dysfunction and divorce, increased demand for child pornography and child sexual abuse, increased prostitution and sex trafficking, violence against women, financial instability and the list continues."
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Diana Chandler is Baptist Press' staff writer. Get Baptist Press headlines and breaking news on Twitter(@BaptistPress), Facebook (Facebook.com/BaptistPress ) and in your email ( baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp).
Copyright (c) 2012 Southern Baptist Convention, Baptist Press www.BPNews.net
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