At a recent event in Washington, D.C., a U.S. legislator and an E.U. legislator announced a joint effort to adopt legislation to address the participation of U.S. and European technology companies in activities of repressive foreign regimes designed to limit access of their citizens to the Internet. The effort targets countries such as China that limit Internet access and which require the providers of Internet services to cooperate in prosecutions of citizens that engage in prohibited Internet conduct.

European Parliament Member Jules Maaten announced that he had drafted the European Online Global Freedom Act for consideration by the European Parliament. The draft legislation would, among other things, prohibit European companies from locating servers or other computer hardware used to provide Internet services in countries that restrict Internet freedom. The law also directed relevant regulatory bodies to promulgate regulations that would prohibit export of items that would be used by foreign countries to restrict Internet freedom and access. It would also prohibit filtering search engine requests at the request of foreign officials of such countries.

On the U.S. side, U.S. Representative Chris Smith (R – N.J.) has introduced the Global Online Freedom Act which roughly parallels the draft European legislation, but is somewhat less restrictive on the activities of U.S. companies. Smith’s legislation, which has been passed out of committee and is on the House’s Union Calendar, requires disclosure of any search engine filtering done at the behest of foreign officials in a country restricting Internet freedom but doesn’t prohibit the company from performing such filtering. It also directs the Department of Commerce to conduct a feasibility study addressing possible export controls on items used to restrict Internet freedom.

Whether or not these proposals will get any traction in their respective legislative bodies, it is safe to say that there is heightened awareness of these issues by legislators and that some export restrictions may ultimately be adopted to counter the worst instances of cooperation by U.S. and European Internet companies with repressive and authoritarian regimes. Of course, whether that will lead to more or less Internet freedom in such countries is an open question — repressive regimes are probably more likely to respond to such sanctions by further limiting access to the Internet rather than by simply eliminating all Internet restrictions.

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