In response to concerns that a new firewall on the Penn State network will infringe upon students' constitutional rights, administrators have said the firewall is legal and legitimate.

The firewall, which will be implemented by next fall to help protect on-campus network users from security problems such as viruses and spam e-mail messages, will also limit or block students' use of file-sharing programs like Kazaa.

While this might seem to violate students' freedom to download music, Clay Calvert, associate professor of communications and law and co-director of the Pennsylvania Center for the First Amendment, said the action is within the university's legal rights as an Internet access provider.

"Penn State has a right to control the servers it makes available to its students," Calvert said. "I don't believe students' [First] Amendment rights are being violated."

He said the network is "not designated to all-purpose public forms," which means the university can monitor and restrict users' activities to comply with the network's needs.

"If Penn State is providing the server upon which students download information, it gives Penn State some ability to control their use," he said.

Undergraduate Student Government (USG) Academic Assembly President D. Josh Troxell agreed the firewall would not infringe upon students' rights.

"The university owns the network," he said. "It has the right [to implement a firewall]."

Every student signs a network connection agreement before receiving a user ID on the Penn State network.

This agreement states that students who use the network for illegal purposes are in violation of university policy.

"By signing the contract, [students] have agreed to this," he said. "Everything the university is doing is legitimate."

Robin Anderson, assistant director of Information Technology Services, has said the main reason for the decision to implement a firewall was improving security, not blocking Kazaa.

USG Vice President Takkeem Morgan said he realizes the university is trying to protect network users from unsafe outside sources, but the fact that students cannot choose how to share files is too great a sacrifice.

While the firewall is legal, Morgan said he thinks students should be aware that it calls into question certain personal rights.

"The university is only seeing it from one perspective -- to obey the law and to be an example to students of following the law. But the law is not the end-all, be-all in this case," he said.

"Students need to give an adequate response to this, maybe not by screaming and hollering, but by researching the issue."

Penn State spokesman Tysen Kendig said the firewall is also intended to stop students from sharing files illegally on the Penn State network.

"It is designed to prevent students from running servers out of the residence halls," he said.