NNSquad - Network Neutrality Squad
[ NNSquad ] Politicos Gone Wild: UK Wants Blocking of All "Porn" Sites By Default
Politicos Gone Wild: UK Wants Blocking of All "Porn" Sites By Default
http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000792.html
Greetings. Politicians make a lot of stupid and self-serving
statements for political points. Now comes word that in the UK,
politicos are calling for the blocking by default of *all* "porn"
sites ( http://bit.ly/i5Qn8s [news.com.au] ). They're supporting this
inane concept with the bizarre and completely inaccurate assertion
that ISPs have already successfully blocked child porn in some
significant way. That's a completely ridiculous claim -- the removal
or blocking of certain sites says little useful about the overall
universe of such materials online, especially from well cloaked sites,
or via non-Web-site movement of such items through other Internet
channels -- all of which are known to continue largely unabated
despite Internet blocking efforts.
By the way, who gets to decide which sites qualify as "porn"? The
government? Concerned citizens? A newly constituted Morality League?
Given that Google can be handy in finding any information of
interest -- including everything from porn to policy to potatoes, will
the UK government suggest blocking of Google by default as well? No?
Then their anti-porn system may have more than a few holes. Gosh darn it,
search engines have this nasty habit of finding what people want,
whether or not the government moralists and protectors of the faith
approve.
Hmm. What about blocking YouTube? Lots of somewhat "unwholesome"
material on there, too. That's what free speech is all about. Oops,
forgot, we're talking about the UK. No worries about free speech
guarantees there -- no pesky Bill of Rights to get in the way of Her
Majesty's thought police. Though to be fair, it's not clear how much
longer the Bill of Rights will be fully operative here in the States
for that matter.
Yet to assume that you could block children (except for the very
youngest) from accessing materials that they really want to see is
living in Fantasyland. Kids will be the first to find workaround and
proxy sites -- even if they have to set up their own! And most of the
parents won't be the wiser.
This appears to all be leading (and the linked article hints at this)
to the requirement that Internet users only be allowed to access by
default an "approved" list of sites that have been guaranteed as
cleansed by the government (might want to leave out most of those
pesky political sites as well, right?)
Anyone wanting access to materials on the porn list (or other broader
forbidden lists) would of course be closely watched as a known pervert
and/or potential enemy of the state.
Cue the Ministry of Love.
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein (lauren@vortex.com)
http://www.vortex.com/lauren
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
Co-Founder, PFIR (People For Internet Responsibility): http://www.pfir.org
Founder, NNSquad (Network Neutrality Squad): http://www.nnsquad.org
Founder, GCTIP (Global Coalition for Transparent Internet Performance):
http://www.gctip.org
Founder, PRIVACY Forum: http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/laurenweinstein
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