Why you shouldn't support legislation blocking internet porn

[Andrewjh]

Ed Vaizey and Claire Perry and a number of other politicians are trying to force ISPs to block adult content under the pretence of "think of the children", however this will have the opposite effect and could lead to children being exposed to far greater problems.

• Children these days are very tech savvy, especially with regard to the internet. And they need to be - the UK is the largest internet economy in the world. To succeed in the UK in the future, you'll need to know your way around a computer and around the internet from an early age.

• What happens when ISPs block sites is something called the Streisand Effect. Basically by banning it, they generate a huge amount of publicity and support for the sites. The Pirate Bay site last week got blocked in the UK, and it received traffic increases of 12 million users downloading millions of pounds worth of software, music, films and games. Blocking something increases its internet traffic, its exposure, and suddenly 30 times more people know about it than did before.

• What also happens when you block these sites is a huge amount of internet users figure out free and easy ways around the blocks. ISP's don't have the resources to stop this, and in most cases, it is impossible for them to do so. anyway. The Pirate Bay blocks can be got around within 20 seconds, and that is just googling "how do I get around pirate bay blocks".

• Many of the methods employed by users to get around the Pirate Bay blocks so they can illegally download files will also be posted as guides to get around porn blocks. These are accessible through any search engine (google, bing, yahoo).

• The problem is that tech savvy children (it only takes one to find out how from the internet or an older brother, then tell his friends, who tell their friends etc) can easily find out how to get around it. I mean it is as easily as it is to look up something for their homework, if not easier.

• The other more dangerous issue is that whilst once they've gone through those guides, they can easily find links to far darker sites which host horrific viruses, hackers, as well as references to drugs, drink and other adult content. They can also find links to anonymous chatrooms where they could meet anyone without you knowing.

• This is the danger that opt in and blocking poses. They will give you a sense of security when there is none.

• This is also based on the assumption that the block actually blocks all porn. They rarely ever do, and sites posing as sex education sites which don't get blocked get through with adult content. So you'll be under the illusion that the internet is safely blocked when it isn't.

Think of it like this. Imagine the internet is a cliff, and we are having a picnic at the top of the cliff. It's a mostly beautiful view, but if you let your guard down, you could fall off. You wouldn't let your child play near the edge. Installing the opt in system is like putting a strong looking but flimsy fence in place. You could be fooled in to thinking it was safe but left to their own devices your child, could easily fall through. We can't put a brick wall there otherwise it spoils the natural beauty of the view (the educational benefits of the internet).

So what to do? Firstly don't support legislation calling for blocks. It doesn't work, its been shown not to work in the past as well as more recently. Children can easily find a way around it, and in doing so find a far darker side of the internet.

Secondly: If you are concerned, use censoring software on your computer, but don't be content with just that. Use Browser tracking software like this - www.any-activity-monitor.com/free-browser-history-recorder.html so you can accurate tell what your child has been viewing, even if they delete it off the browser. There are also many simple, free and easy tutorials written online on how to better protect your computer and your child.

Thirdly: Take some time to talk to your child about internet use. It can be an amazing tool but it can be dangerous. They need to know that right and wrong, safe and risky, they all still apply online (something easy to forget I assure you). They'll avoid things if they know its wrong. They will be curious about things if its only blocked.

Lastly, don't be fooled by people using the "think of the children" line. It's an alarmist appeal to emotion. There is very little danger so long as you use your common sense and only allow a child a sensible amount of time on the internet. As a politics student, I have to question whether this has been saved up till now to gain support for the government after an miserable turn in recent polls.

Thanks very much for reading, I hope you'll consider your position.

I want vulnerable children protected.
I also dont want them to see violent and gory images on the internet.
And let us not be naive that there will be some people, who knows where ,who do want children to be abused.Dont forget this.

There were large bidders who bid for the NHS IT contracts. Half a billion later and the contract was left with no centralised records and plenty of profit and turnover for years but no product up to the task delivered.

Sure you could throw a large amount of money at the problem. Is it not better to spend the limited child protection pot on this or on educating parents and removing the truly vulnerable from their situations.

Radical thought, but how about we ban anyone aged under 18 from getting online at all?

OldLadyKnowsNothing

How would you achieve that? Would everyone receive an 'internet login' when they reach 18? And how would you stop people trading them?

Snorbs

Actually contary to popular belief that is not true

"The £20million HomeSafe filter works by automatically blocking a list of ?adult content? such as porn, violence, gambling and drugs.

Read more: www.metro.co.uk/tech/899019-talktalk-customers-get-internet-porn-filter-choice#ixzz1urCsLhCI"

It is odd to me people have focused on the pornography aspect of this. Why is that?

In fact OldLady...let's ban the Internet completely! I mean surely if it saves one child........

"It is odd to me people have focused on the pornography aspect of this. Why is that?"

Something to do with the ISP filter being sold as a porn filter maybe? Just a thought..

Oh, is that what talk talk says on their website? i dont think do.

Flatpack, maybe we'd have to start chipping babies at birth, and the chip would contain info such as name and dob, along with a transponder widgit to "switch on" t'internet. Could work for all sorts of other stuff, like buying booze and fags...

Its actually laughable some of you think yourselfs as the liberal parent fighting for freedom for the children....

Yeah, By sitting next to them holding their friggin hand everytime they go in the internet! How radical of you.

Not an invasion to privacy or freedom at all

I glance at the computer screen to make sure it's saying MyMaths, Facebook or Minecraft rather than Hot'n'Horny, Gory Videos'R'Us or 4chan.

If you regard that as an intolerable invasion of my 13yo DS's privacy then fair enough. I regard it as taking responsibility for what my child is up to on a global network.

...and it could include some sort of GPS system, so missing children could be easily found, that'd stop the peedos too...

Oh wow, glances... Forget AVP we just need to do more glancing.

What do you want me to say?

Starwisher was making a point about invasion of privacy. I was responding how I do not regard what I do as a serious enough invasion of DCs' privacy versus the risks inherent in Internet use.

My experience is that being in the same room with an Internet-using child and having a decent PC-based filtering system that I keep an eye on has worked very well for me.

You can call me a liar, you can disregard my experience, you can believe I'm wrong, you can tell me exactly how you think I'm missing the point. Or you can make some poorly expressed sarcastic comment. Go ahead, knock yourself out.

I think it is a wilful misinterpretation to say the majority of posters who are calling for age appropriate supervision (see oodles of posts passim) and devices in communal areas is in any way comparable to "sitting next to them holding their friggin hand everytime they go in the internet!".

Though I suppose some parents may need to take that approach if their DCs are not in the habit of following house rules or have yet to demonstrate they have benefitted from even the most rudimentary education about online safety.

What will you do when your child no longer wants to be on the pc with mum/ dad in the room?

What will you do when they older and you leave them alone at home?

What will you do when they go to mates houses?

What about other peoples children?

1... hasn't arisen yet (eldest is a teen, btw)
2&3... the only thing that can work in either of those circumstances is the sense of standards, morality, ethics and self-preservation that you have tried to instil in them, with regard to every hazard in life, since infancy. With every aspect of life, self-regulation will at some point displace externally imposed regulation.
4... by supporting every initiative that promotes best practice. So, device-level filtering software, education and age appropriate supervision, as that is the set of options which gives the best protection now. And opposing gimmicky proposals from MPs that offer worse protection than what I have just said.

1. You dont know that, he could be accessing the internet elsewhere when your back is turned. It would be very easy in this day and age.
2. How naive. Being curious about porn does NOT make someone an immoral low life with no ethics you know. Its human nature to be interested in sex especially teenagers. I would be more surprised if one hadnt at least attempted to look.
3. Again naive, unrealitstic and incrediably uncaring to children not your own. Very " Im alright Jack"

I know you are absolutely determined to misinterpret this, but I will attempt (once more) to explain this to you.

The idea behind supervising the computer use is this..

• Being in the room with them will discourage them from deliberately looking up inappropriate content as they'd be worried about being seen doing it.
• If they stumble on things by accident it also allows the parents to talk to the child about it and/or add the site to the blocked list.

The most important part of this is education. For the parents and for the children.

It's impossible to entirely stop them from ever seeing anything inappropriate, all you can do is educate them so that it is not so damaging.

I suspect that the reason you keep asking those of us who are against the ISP filter to explain how we'd protect our children outside of our home isn't because you are interested in a solution, but more because you'd like to paint us as bad parents who want our children (and everyone elses) to view porn.

Once again, this thread is primarily about the ISP filter, and why it is not a practical solution. It is not a thread about refusing to protect children. It is about being realistic with what can actually be done.

You say misunderstanding, I say I understand perfectly and I am showing you the flaws that you are wholly naive and unrealistic about. The fact is, you are unhappy about the fact fundemtal flaws in plan have been highlighted to you and there is currently no remedy.

Beats me why continue to repeat yourself over and over again. They are not exactly earth shattering revelations, its basic stuff.

Do you think if you keep copy and pasting your methods your going to wear me down and get me to blindly agree with you in a herd mentality you are hoping to excercise over this thread?

Or you could advance your argument and consider there are still issues that need to be tackled that leave our children vunreable.

You say you want to be realistic about what can be done, yet your idea of real is to constantly nay-say.

As a conclusion I say you have no interest at all in looking into safe guarding advancment and are using this thread as petty point scoring excercise.

"You say you want to be realistic about what can be done, yet your idea of real is to constantly nay-say."

So what would you prefer? Someone comes up with an impossible to implement plan and I lie and say it'll work?

How is AVP impossible?

"1. You dont know that, he could be accessing the internet elsewhere when your back is turned. It would be very easy in this day and age"

You asked about what if he's not happy to access Internet in front of parents. I have daily evidence that he is still happy to do this. Hence my response that the circumstances have not yet arisen; all children are happy to use computers downstairs.

Access beyond the home was covered in my answers to 2 and 3.

It is now twice on this thread there have been snidey comments implying I am a bad parent.

It would be better to stay on track about why the proposals currently in the news are technically flawed and do not merit support. And what the better options are and why they do deserve much more vociferous support.

Edith I dont think your bad parent at all, you are obviously very passionate about your childs safety- pointing out there is still flaws to anybody children (including my own) because of how things currently is no implication or attempt to paint your parenting as inadequate.

The concerns I express for your children will be exactly the same I will have for my when they are old enough, and for other peoples childrens.

I think its rather mean spirtied ( and takes some audacity) of you to accuse me of implying your a bad parent when, infact you have made constant snide remarks about how if any children do look at adult material they are unedcuated/ immoral/ have no ethics.

However I Choose to rise above that as I think your very wrong to suggest that, and it doesnt effect me anyway.

As for staying on track edith, you seem perfectly happy to let the thread veer off track when utter rubbish about GPSing our kids starts getting posted. At least be consistent if you insist this thread is repetitive.

I agree that GPSing is totally irrelevant to the proposals. (And it is also very flawed as a technology to be implanted; I could enumerate the problems, but thought that would divert the thread; and if it looked as if that irrelevancy was going to take over, yes I'll comment on that too).

Also I didn't mean to single out specific recent posts in which my parenting has been questioned. The snidey one was from ages upthread with a totally unnecessary comment about "perfect" children.

Whether or not I'm a good parent is wholly irrelevant; it does not undermine the vital importance of education for online security, the wider ethics of porn or horror or violence, or any other of the other hazards of life.

There are good messages on this thread about the best ways to protect children. They are better than those proposed, and are available now. They are the points that should not get buried in slews of tangential posts.