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

NotGoodNotBad

We have laws that prevent minors from buying alcohol and cigarettes, we don't expect parents to police this. Why should access to internet porn be different?

Would you accept the same limitations on TV and books and by extension on anything that might 'harm' minors?

We have laws that prevent minors from buying alcohol and cigarettes, we don't expect parents to police this. Why should access to internet porn be different?

Well actually parents do police this. It is illegal for kids to purchase alcohol and cigarettes from a shop, that is all that the law actually stipulates - it's not illegal for children to partake of alcohol or cigarettes in the home.

Parents are expected to ensure that their children do not partake of alcohol or cigarettes when they are in their own home.

So equally (to my mind) parents should ensure that their children do not have access to internet porn when they are in their own home.

(Very simplistic I know)

As much as I agree with you Murder of Goths (your name always makes me think of Sophie Lancaster :( ) I just don't see that this is going to happen. We have nothing to fear from a law that simply can't be implemented.

I think it's worth remembering that the internet originally was a military project and designed to be robust and resilient to attack, without crucial single points of failure. If routers were destroyed then the protocols were such as to enable alternative routes to be used. Similarly with attempts to block information/data.

In the words of one internet guru (can't remember the name), the internet treats censorship as a malfunction and works around it.

At least Canute was aware that he couldn't turn back the tide. Cameron is not so wise. He seems to have little concept of the nature of the internet and its distributed non-centralised nature. He's like an old Soviet apparatchik deciding what the proles shall be permitted to read in Pravda. It's not like that.

AKiss Well I don't know. It can't be properly implemented but I don't think that means we have nothing to fear. I think a danger is that various totally innocent people will be caught up and possibly lives ruined, because of the impossibility of identifying porn by software.

NotGoodBad what would you think then when you went to buy a drink but sorry its been confused for alcohol so its not being stocked? Would you find it odd if you had to have your name on a government list to specify you were an alcohol drinker? Would you not find it bizarre that the government presumed everyone doesn't want alcoholic drinks?

At best its a hollow legislation that will do nothing, the dangers of accidentally stumbling upon porn are much overstated. If you're looking for it, no doubt you'll find it, but its not on every corner as the daily mail and the like make out. At worst its a dangerous begining of censorship of the internet, things like search terms being banned for example for being "extreme". Extrapolate that out and a situation becomes very possible where search terms that "are concerns for national security" get banned, strangely banning opposition blogs and dissenting voices...

Good point somebloke. Thank goodness for organisations like Backlash.

Plenty

I do honestly agree that education is the key.

But lets be honest with the current options available your name would be blacklisted as would a huge amount of research in to abuse, rape, DV, EA etc.

I hate to think of the amount of literature and music that would fall foul of this.

AKiss I never thought my name could make people think of that, that was horrific :(

But yes, as the others on the thread have said the risk is that they'll try to make it happen and cause problems in the process.

Sadly cases have already occurred with the 'extreme porn' ban. There was an incident where a man was prosecuted for sharing a rude cartoon of Tony the Tiger as it was deemed to be bestiality! It was a joke cartoon FFS. Fortunately I believe the jury saw sense but still, lives ruined for that.

Plenty

Why confused.

I do honestly agree that education is the key.

I agree.

But lets be honest with the current options available your name would be blacklisted as would a huge amount of research in to abuse, rape, DV, EA etc.

I hate to think of the amount of literature and music that would fall foul of this.

I agree again, but I'm not sure what this has to do with advocating education.

Plenty I think Boney meant that education rather than this filter would prevent innocent things falling foul of the filter.

Oh ... I agree

Sorry, it was just an off hand comment about the way some filters work.

murder has it in one.

I will step away from the keyboard for a while until I can work in full sentences. :)

I think what I'd most like to see is a freeware program (crowdsourced especially) that had these different levels of use (age 5-7, 10-12, etc). Maybe the lower levels set as a whitelist of approved kid friendly sites, then opened up as a blacklist for the older age groups. With the ability to send reports of sites that are wrongly blocked or not blocked to a wiki style set up which could then be moderated and used to update the filtering programme. I'm pretty certain something like this probably already exists - DS is 16mo though so I've not really looked too much into them.

murderofgoths I think you just described norton family!!! That's what we use - its free (I think) per user per computer. So adults can have anything and you have default levels of protection for different ages. If they try a banned site they have the option to ask a parent (automatic email) and you can whitelist it.

Problem is it takes more set up/knowledge rhan getting the ISP to block all porn

That is the issue, someone needs to work out an intuitive user interface, one that even the most tech illiterate can use. It can be done, there are some amazing UI designers out there.

It would be fair to say that Claire Perry, for example, isn't someone whose opinion on the internet should be taken seriously.

Cameron ?Porn? Advisor?s website ?hacked? ? Threatens/Libels Blogger

Wow, hadn't seen that Raven

She really hasn't got the faintest has she??

In case people don't want to read the whole link Claire Perry's websites was hacked and pornographic content was put up there.

Guido Fawkes, a blogger, wrote a blog about it, including a screenshot/photo of the hacked page (without showing any porn).

Perry threatened him with legal action for blogging about it, she threatened that she was going to try and get him sacked, and accused him of "sponsoring" the hack. Totally failing to grasp what a screenshot was.

Quite.

& if she doesn't understand the difference between a link & a screengrab, I really wouldn't expect her to grasp how a proxy works, say.

There are obviously veritable herds of magical unicorns gambolling through the empty spaces in her head.

Shocking amount of ignorance for someone so involved in this!

Filters drive me insane. The amount of innocent things that they block is mental. Yet at the same time you can get a pop up, and in your face is a massive pair of breasts. This btw was in the past few years, even with a filter encouraged by the LA that blocked youtube and some educational sites. But the innocent wording on the pop up meant it was fine.

Education really is key. Something is not getting through to parents that actually you need to monitor your child's usage. This is something that needs to be addressed, because I really don't think that the parents I speak to, are a true indication of the faults. Because these think well I have filters at home so I don't need to monitor access.