When you think about the Internet do you associate it with freedom of expression?

Well things could be changing after anti-abortionists in the US were fined $107m for an Internet campaign which published a "hit list" of doctors.

A federal jury in Portland, Oregon, found that wanted-style posters of abortion doctors on the Nuremberg Files Website amounted to death threats.

However defendant Catherine Ramney said later: "This is a moral and constitutional outrage. There was no threat and they knew it."

Such controversy is not exceptional. Pennsylvania filed a suit last October against white supremacists whose Website contained threats against state employees. America Online have also been criticised in the past for allowing web pages to be set up by the Klu Klux Klan.

Is freedom of speech under threat?

There is a strong culture that believes the Net as a medium should represent every kind of view and information.

However Internet Service Providers recognise that certain material should be filtered out for the sake of children.

Can the Net really be policed?

In the largely unregulated and liberal environment of the Internet, technology has been the only effective censor up till now.

Users can employ software to block access from their computer systems to sites containing offensive material, but the sites will still exist for those who share the same interests and wish to visit.

People who have had their sites banned in one country can simply operate in another.

Attempts to legislate have so far been unsuccessful. Hours before a Child Online Protection Act (COPA) was due to become law in the US, a federal judge ruled it unconstitutional.

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Can the Net be policed?

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