PLDT, Inc. and its wireless arm Smart Communications, Inc. on Monday said conflicting laws prevent them from doing more to protect children on the internet.

“Some provisions in the Anti-Child Pornography Law are holding us back because they encroach on the rights of citizens and contradict existing laws,” Roy Cecil D. Ibay, Smart vice president for Legal and Regulatory Affairs, said in a statement.

He cited Republic Act 10173 or the Data Privacy Act of 2012 and RA 10175 or the Cybercrime Prevention Law.

The law mandates internet service providers to actively monitor and block any material that promotes child pornography passing through their servers, the companies said. It also orders them to install software that will filter out these illicit content.

But it noted in a position paper submitted to the Justice department that this contradicts clause that says “Nothing in this section may be construed to require an ISP to engage in the monitoring of any user, subscriber or customer or the content of any communication of any such person.”

The PLDT group said information about a message’s origin, destination, route and size are “considered property, thus they should be protected against unreasonable searches and seizures under the Bill of Rights.”

“Likewise, the Constitution also guarantees privacy of communication,” it added.

Hastings Holdings, Inc., a unit of PLDT Beneficial Trust Fund subsidiary MediaQuest Holdings, Inc., has a stake in BusinessWorld through the Philippine Star Group, which it controls. — Arjay L. Balinbin

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