Agreement with AG alters Topix policies

Local News

August 10, 2010

By Emily Burton Register News Writer The Richmond Register Tue Aug 10, 2010, 12:00 PM EDT

RICHMOND — Topix.com, a popular website forum, will have to make several changes to its policies after reaching an agreement with Attorney General Jack Conway, and the attorneys general of 30 other states and three United States territories.

The agreement requires Topix to drop a $19.99 fee, among several other stipulations. This fee was charged to customers who wanted review of abusive or inappropriate posts hastened.

Now, review of abusive posts is free, and Topix will be required to review the posts within three working days. Prior to the agreement, it took as long as 14 working days to review posts.

The agreement was spearheaded through an effort led by Conway and Richard Blumenthal, attorney general of Connecticut, and Jon Burning, attorney general of Nebraska, according to a press release from Conway’s office.

Conway approached the other attorneys general after many Kentuckians approached him about Topix, said Allison Martin, communications director at the Office of the Attorney General.

“He discovered that this is not just a problem in Kentucky but also across the country, and the other attorneys general agreed to sign and support (the agreement),” she said.

The agreement is not the result of any legal action. However, should Topix fail to keep the requirements of the agreement, it could face legal action, Martin said.

“It was made clear to Topix that there could be a lawsuit,” she said.

In addition to dropping the fee and expediting review times, Topix also must: cooperate with law enforcement in combating unlawful activity on its website; discuss “issues of concern,” including responsiveness to abusive reports and other consumer complaints on an as-needed basis with all of the attorneys general who signed the agreement; and continue to develop new technology and processes that will help prevent misuse of the site, the agreement said.

The fee needed to be eliminated and the timeline of reviewing posts quickened because the delay and the fee were wrong, Martin said.

“(Conway) felt this was unfair that people had to pay to get their good name back,” she said.

She also said Topix must hire more employees to review posts. The purpose is not to simply get abusive posts removed, but to prevent them from ever appearing on the site, Martin said.

It is not typical for police to receive formal complaints about posts on Topix, said Larry Brock, Richmond police chief.

“Occasionally we get informal complaints — its rare that we get formal complaints,” he said. In order for a post to be punishable under the law, it would have to be “very specific,” he said.

An informal complaint, Brock said, is when someone approaches an officer and speaks their peace, but doesn’t ask for any police intervention.

Berea Police Capt. Ken Clark said his department, too, receives complaints about Topix.

“We’ve received complaints before, but unfortunately, there’s not a whole lot that we can do about it, because of First Amendment rights,” he said.

The posts typically are made in anonymous manner and many of the complaints Clark said the department receives are informal.

“When people want to make a formal complaint, I usually send them to the Attorney General’s office,” Clark said.

As part of the agreement, Topix has removed a “flagging” feature from the site. This had been used to report abusive posts, but it was “ineffective and confusing for consumers,” the press release from the AG’s office said.

“It required multiple users to ‘flag’ a post before it was reviewed. As a result, many inappropriate posts that consumers thought they had reported were never reviewed,” Conway said in the release.

The agreement also said that Topix has developed a “Law Enforcement Primer” that will provide contact information including a telephone number, and e-mail address so that law enforcement agencies across the United States can more easily contact Topix.

“The primer will include instructions on points of contact and requirements for subpoena and search warrant requests,” according to the agreement.

The Attorney General, as well as those who signed the agreement, will continue to keep their eyes on Topix to ensure that the requirements of the agreement are met, Martin said.

Topix.com is headquarters in Palo Alto, Calif. In addition to Kentucky, Nebraska and California, the agreement was signed by the attorneys general of: Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Guam, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, Nevada, North Dakota, Northern Mariana Islands, New Hampshire, Ohio, Oklahoma, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and West Virginia.

Emily Burton may be reached at eburton@richmondregister.com or at 624-6694. Follow Emily on Twitter at twitter.com/RR_EBurton

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