MONTGOMERY, Ala. — The Alabama House of Representatives is considering a bill that would require the installation of pornography filters on all smartphones and internet reading devices for sale. Under HB428, selling a device without such a filter would be punishable by up to one year in prison. If the device were to be sold to a minor, the crime would become a Class C felony with a sentence of up to 10 years.

In order for a person to have the filter deactivated, he or she would have to submit a written request and pay a $20 fee to the government. Such provisions have made the bill a target for civil liberties groups who attack it on free speech and right to privacy grounds.

Supporters of the bill say it is a necessary step to help curb online sexual exploitation services and harassment.

According to the language in the bill, the filter will block any material that “facilitates or promotes prostitution, assignation, human trafficking, or sexual cyber harassment.” It would also have the broad ability to censor anything “the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would find, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest,” or “depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct or excretory functions.”

Rep. Jack Williams (R-Vestavia Hills), who introduced the bill, has submitted legislation to restrict the adult entertainment industry before. In 2015, Williams sponsored a bill to levy a 40 percent tax on “receipts from the sale of sexually oriented materials” to help fill the $250 million hole in Alabama’s General Fund budget.

The bill has 23 co-sponsors and is sitting in the House Commerce and Small Business Committee.