If you have picked up a newspaper recently, you’ve probably read something about Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. That once-obscure law has become a hot topic, and “Section 230” has entered the popular lexicon even though most people—even many lawyers—don’t know exactly what it does, how it works, or why it exists in the first place.

Because Section 230 involves the politically charged issue of regulating speech on the internet, descriptions of the law and its function can sometimes be colored by extrinsic factors that may or may not be relevant to the reader.