That bloody ISP porn filter bollocks is back again

[MurderOfGoths]

BBC News article

And because I can't be bothered to type it all out yet again, here's a load of reasons why it's a load of bollocks

Why it's wishing for a unicorn

[fromparistoberlin]

flatpack

if you wanted to enrol me, or make me learn that there might be a different way, you failed. completely

as OP said its an emotive topic. and maybe I dont know enough, read too much DM online. probably.

But we had an earlier "discussion" shit fight on this issue on here and someone managed to very easily search, and find child abuse images. She did not linik them, thank fuck!

I mean that is WRONG on so many levels

[MurderOfGoths]

fromparis That's the thing, child porn can still be found, despite ISPs and search engines teaming up to stop it, despite child abuse sites attempting to hide from people, and despite the people that host/share it being prosecuted.

If all of that isn't enough, then an ISP porn filter wont help, not will it block adult-adult porn.

[flatpackhamster]

fromparistoberlin

if you wanted to enrol me, or make me learn that there might be a different way, you failed. completely

I wasn't bothered about teaching you because you've shown no interest in learning. Why should I put myself out?

as OP said its an emotive topic.

And the problem is that policy is being made by people like you who put emotion before rational behaviour. If you're going to make policy you need to take the emotion out of it.

and maybe I dont know enough, read too much DM online. probably.

Yes, and yes.

But we had an earlier "discussion" shit fight on this issue on here and someone managed to very easily search, and find child abuse images. She did not linik them, thank fuck!

I mean that is WRONG on so many levels

Porn filters won't stop it. Just doing something isn't the answer. You want it fixed, get money shoved to CEOP. Giving government the power to content filter every home broadband in the country isn't going to solve shit.

[fromparistoberlin]

what is the answer then? I want to have hope there is something!

I know we cant stop the people that DO it, thats like trying to stop the rain

But it frustrates me that we have this seemingly sophisticated technology, and yet..

look at what the FBI can bloody do, what intelligence manage to detect terrorists etc

and yes I reacted angrily, but I am not angry with you 2, just at the world!

[MurderOfGoths]

I get that fromparis. I don't know how we stop child abuse or remove it entirely from the net, I think we are doing all we can. Suspect having more people doing the horrific job of manually filtering the web would help moist, as would more people working on prosecutions. Don't envy those poor souls at all though.

Either way, this isn't the solution, and isn't even trying to be the solution.

[Xales]

Unless I turn off the orange mobile filter on my account mumsnet is blocked.

Not surprising as there are threads on anal sex, penis size, strip clubs, prostitution, child abuse etc all over it.

[flatpackhamster]

fromparistoberlin

what is the answer then? I want to have hope there is something!

The answer to what? How to stop perverts trading images of child abuse?

There isn't a quick easy fix. You need to give the police the resources to do the job they're trained to do. And it won't ever go away. Ever.

I know we cant stop the people that DO it, thats like trying to stop the rain

But it frustrates me that we have this seemingly sophisticated technology, and yet..

look at what the FBI can bloody do, what intelligence manage to detect terrorists etc

I think you've been watching too much TV.

[fromparistoberlin]

flatpack

time after time intelligence agencies manage to filter/acess email accounts to arrest terrorists. Its on the news! But I guess they are people they were suspicious of in the first place?

so my question is why are we not able to channel this technology in this area. I get that if you IT savvy seeing someone do a seemingly "easy win" policy must be frustrating to say the least

and yet....I just find this very hard to comprehend how we cannot channel the technology we have (in part) created, to adress this

I though you IT folk were clever

[fromparistoberlin]

just to be clear

I am not referring to home PCs. I think parents need to take responsibility here. OP I did take a look at your blog, thanks.

I refer to the fact that if you search for certain terms, you will get a hit. Morally, I think the ISPs should have a certain list of common terms (pertaining to child abuse) that if searched for, create an alert. I wont even type the terms, but I think if you look at some of what Stuart Hazell looked for you will get the gist.

I am curious why noone wants this? Yes its the tip of the iceberg, but I finf it morally reprehensible that google (at al) dont even have alerts on this.

does this make sense?

[LittleDirewolfBitJoffrey]

Fromparis, you seem to want a magical solution, a fix-all, which doesn't exist. In order to make the internet safe from child abuse images/videos etc we need to eradicate child abuse. Its that simple. And that difficult.

I do understand the passion and frustration that drives you to want the solution, but you have to understand that the internet is as wonderful as it is awful; it is the users of it who make it that way, not the technology itself.

[MurderOfGoths]

Actually from what I know with intelligence, they miss more than they catch (even with PRISM)

We don't have the technology yet. Remember the technology we are working with (the internet) was only originally intended to send text between computers. It's come a long way, but was never designed to do what it does today. It was also never meant to become this massive international thing that needed policing.

Even the technology you use to view websites is a bit of a bodge job, trust me, I've done a fair bit of coding. A lot of websites are held together with the tech equivalent of sellotape!

I have explained how websites work and store info, and why it is virtually impossible to use that tech to apply filters in my earlier link.

[MurderOfGoths]

"I refer to the fact that if you search for certain terms, you will get a hit."

Sometimes. Sometimes not.
I know I've used search terms and got really unrelated responses, or not being able to find the thing I wanted.

I think they probably do use keywords like that, but a lot of words can have mutliple meanings.

Eg. if someone is searching for "pussy", it'll come up with both porn and websites about cats.

Someone on another site pointed out the Lolita is a common terms used for child abuse images, but it's also a valid female name and the name of a famous book.

There's very few terms which will only point to dodgy sites and not to others.

[flatpackhamster]

fromparistoberlin

flatpack

time after time intelligence agencies manage to filter/acess email accounts to arrest terrorists. Its on the news! But I guess they are people they were suspicious of in the first place?

GCHQ already monitors internet and emails but the deluge of information is so colossal that they don't have a hope. What usually happens is they get assigned a target, an interesting individual and they then go after that person and check their records going back a few years. It isn't a random trawl of information.

so my question is why are we not able to channel this technology in this area. I get that if you IT savvy seeing someone do a seemingly "easy win" policy must be frustrating to say the least

and yet....I just find this very hard to comprehend how we cannot channel the technology we have (in part) created, to adress this

I though you IT folk were clever

Tell me how it'd work. Let's say you use a keyword system to block people looking at child abuse images. So what happens if they stop using one word and start using another. What happens if they start using the word 'lego' to refer to images of child abuse. "Have you got any good lego?"

How would keywords deal with that?

What about if you want to block search engines from handling child abuse images. Well, they already do it. So there's this thing called the Dark Net, which is sort-of-but-not-quite connected to the internet. Dark Net doesn't use Google, it's under its radar. So that doesn't work.

The images and videos are traded using a system called Peer to Peer. that means that the data is streamed directly from computer A to computer B, without it ever being stored on the 'internet'. The data can be encrypted so it can't be read en-route but that can attract the attention of the authorities, so it usually isn't. There's SO MUCH DATA out there that a few million pictures or videos don't even get noticed.

So you could block the data ports that P2P uses, but they'd change the ports (there are 65,000 ports to choose from). And you can't block P2P because so much other stuff relies on it.

So what do you do?

[FlowersBlown]

I don't know anything technical, but as soon as I heard about this on the news it sounded like a load of rubbish. Nobody will have the bloody thing turned on, because it is bound to block access to non-dodgy sites that people do want to get to. Also practically all men look at porn, and how many households have a man in them? I can't see anyone turning the filters on and off all the time.

[meditrina]

It's not a "porn block".

Some companies offered a 'net nanny' type filter anyhow, so those who wanted one could already have one.

It simply means that all customers will be offered a filter.

But that won't reliably block things you don't want your DC to see, and may block things you do want (even MN has fallen found of such filters before). And of course it blocks every device you connect in the same way - so you can't have one level for you and a different one for DC of different ages.

It's spin, not substance. No improvement on what already exists.

[Pendeen]

"David Cameron and the Daily Mail in a headline-grabbing but essentially meaningless stunt?"

What is the world coming to?

[Absy]

What I find dodgy about it is that you have to "opt in", so now you have to go to your ISP and go "yip, I watch porn/your definition of porn". And if they're legislating to block at ISP level porn, what else are they then going to legislate to block? And how sophisticated are the blocks? At work, we have firewalls to filter out a number of things (porn, blogs, gambling sites etc.) but IT clearly went a bit crazy and also blocked the speedo website, and online women's underwear stores (e.g. Bravissimo) forgetting that (clearly bar the IT department) women work at the organisation and go to these websites for a legitimate purpose.

[fromparistoberlin]

"Think how long it took to find Bin Laden


I think what you have all made me realise is that for every IT genius hired by FBI/MI6/Interpol there is an equally clever one hired by someone with no moral compass, eh voila.....

I have calmed down, its just really upsetting is it not

[LittleDirewolfBitJoffrey]

Flowers, " Also practically all men look at porn, and how many households have a man in them? I can't see anyone turning the filters on and off all the time."

Would you like to re-read your statement and perhaps rephrase. At best it is a massive generalisation of men and women (you know many men do NOT look at porn and conversely there are plenty of women who do enjoy porn) and at worst it is you placing the blame of children stumbling across porn on the internet at the feet of men. Do children in single parent families where the parent is the mother not have this problem then?

[MurderOfGoths]

It really is fromparis so I understand why people want this to be possible, but the desire to have it work is nothing without the technology to make it happen.

[ravenAK]

Ironically enough, this thread has now fallen foul my work firewall!

[MurderOfGoths]

Haha, sounds about right raven.

And demonstrates one of the flaws quite nicely