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anyone read about ISP providers having to filter " adult content"

19 replies

AlaskaNebraska · 14/06/2010 16:25

this wekeend int he times?
i thought was emminently sensible
www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/janice_turner/article7148470.ece

OP posts:
AlaskaNebraska · 14/06/2010 16:28

.

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southeastastra · 14/06/2010 16:38

they should have done this right at the start, it's so depressing how much is out there are easily found. Inprivate browsing makes it easy to hide all traces too - great.

AlaskaNebraska · 14/06/2010 16:39

It si almost as if htey encourage it isnt it

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bibbitybobbityhat · 14/06/2010 16:42

Agreed.

I would be very interested to hear which 1.6% of ISPs refuse to filter out images of child abuse.

And I would definitely switch to TalkTalk if they decided to do this.

(am I right in thinking this is a journo who lives locally to me?).

AlaskaNebraska · 14/06/2010 16:42

it miaggggggggggggght be

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bibbitybobbityhat · 14/06/2010 16:45

Very convincing piece.

MsFire · 14/06/2010 17:07

Why should all these companies assume we WANT porn streamed into our homes. I agree, the assumption should be we don't unless we specifically ask for it. But porn is powerful industry. Who has the guts to take it on?

AlaskaNebraska · 14/06/2010 17:38

like sky having all those channels that until recently you couldnt get rid of

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bibbitybobbityhat · 14/06/2010 17:50

How do you get rid of channels you don't want on tv?

bibbitybobbityhat · 14/06/2010 17:51

Scrub that - will start another thread.

BadgersPaws · 14/06/2010 18:48

While perhaps it's a nice idea it's utterly impractical and opens the door to some very uncomfortable places. It also stops parents having to take responsibility for what their children are doing, which is the one and only real solution to the problem.

Compared to porn there really is very little child sex on the internet. However the IWF (Internet Watch Foundation) which maintains a black list of child sex web sites has a very hard time keeping up and has, at times, grossly overstepped the mark on what pages it bans and how it goes about doing that ban. It's also almost completely beyond scrutiny and control.

How on earth would it be possible to efficiently block all porn from all ISPs as any kind of a default?

It wouldn't.

And that the IWF is so random, so unthinking and so unaccountable is the reason that some ISPs refuse to co-operate with them and implement their black list.

Imagine an IWF whose workload suddenly explodes hundreds, if not thousands, of times.

Shudder.

If you hear anyone seriously talking about proposals to censor the internet their either very ill informed about how such a thing would work or are seeing beyond the possibility of censoring porn and are thinking what else they could cut and restrict.

And all so parents don't have to take responsibility of what their children are up to.

onagar · 14/06/2010 19:09

I'd be perfectly happy with a porn off default setting if such a thing were possible. It really isn't though.

Someone brought out some software that blocked all images with too much pink in them. You can imagine how well that worked. You couldn't buy any pink curtains or paint, but you could see naked women since of course much of the population of the world isn't pink (and nor are most 'white' people really)

The IWF works on complaints about particular images. My ISP dutifully blocked Wikipedia because someone had complained about an image of an album cover that you could buy in a shop. I have heard that they have branched out now into banning other kinds of content they disapprove of. A worrying thought.

In any case it's a bit like standing on a beach pointing to drops of seawater and saying "no we don't want that one.. or that one.."

toccatanfudge · 14/06/2010 19:12

onagar - I remember when we had the porn off default setting on the net nanny thingymajig..........I couldn't view MN - kept blocking pages

BelleDameSansMerci · 14/06/2010 19:22

You've probably all got these kinds of filters (and there are loads more of them) but this one's pretty good here and has a simple password protection to enable access to restricted sites.

Just in case it's useful...

BelleDameSansMerci · 14/06/2010 19:22

Oh and it's free.

onagar · 14/06/2010 19:24

toccatanfudge, Actually I agree with net nanny. MN is pretty disgusting

BadgersPaws · 14/06/2010 19:26

"I remember when we had the porn off default setting on the net nanny thingymajig..........I couldn't view MN - kept blocking page"

And now think of some unaccountably body making that same decision that MN was porn, and then you having to ring some "I want porn" phone number (no doubt charging a peak rate) to try and get access to the sites that you want.

TheShriekingHarpy · 14/06/2010 20:04

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

BadgersPaws · 14/06/2010 21:45

Also who decides what is porn? And what is anyway? Page 3? Loaded magazine? Biology text books? Sex education?

And then how easy to slip from "porn". To "adult content" so as to make the Internet by default "child friendly". It's easy to imagine some people wanting I formation on birth control and abortion to be "adult only". So to get it the bill payer will have to approve the "porn pipe" being turned on. The problems with that should be obvious....

The whole idea is awkward technically, complex implementationally and dubious morally.

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