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well obscene is in the eyes of the beholder (or in this wacky country the "current prevailing community standard" whatever that means) and therefore can never be filtered 100% correctly by any piece of software (whether it is running on wetwear or hardware). The problem is that it can be easily demonstrated that every single piece of commercial nanywear will block out a large volume of apropriate material and allow a large amount of inapropriate material through. Add to this the fact that almost every nanywear company is run by conservative zealots with their own political and moral ax to grind and you end up with the government essentially promoting a form of censorship that eliminates many types of speech and thought that are counter to what a small group of extreme conservatives think is "apropriate". For more explanation please see peacefire

No, they wouldn't. Censorware programs set a double standard for deciding what to block. They will block offensive stuff that they are requested to block unless it comes from a prominent source like an online Bible or the "Family Research Council. It's still bad. Very bad.

As for the editing, I have an idealistic rant on that topic:

Why do we need editing at all for these things? What is wrong with seeing someone naked, or drinking alcohol, or swearing? As Bennett Haselton pointed out, cuss words are just syllables. Bodies are just bodies. This insanity pervades society, and I'm sick of it! It isn't just just religious right wackos who sold their brains to God and think that the rest of us have sold our souls to the devil, it's common among just about everyone you walk up to, at least where I live. Kids in school will curse copiously at each other and call each other "gaywad!" and "jewish!", and it is overlooked. If one of them curses in front of an adult with a word like fuck, however, they'll be scolded in a burning fuse tone of voice. Why the hipocrisy?

Nudity is natural. A little artful nudity can add an excellent touch to something that would stand without it, as a rule. So why is it so near ubiquitously percieved in America as "harmful to children"? Why do films containing suggestive scenes like the one in Zorro actually carry warning labels?

I wish someone would come along and end our society's insanity. But most likely these things will be washed away by time. I await the future.

Ugh, I should read my posts more carefully:

Then you have to consider Triangle boy and it's ilk. The net is rife with circumvention tools! Take Peacefire for example.

I've sat in on a few "filtering the net" round table discussions in the recent past, and I can tell you that beyond disonnectiong the whole population from the net there is no censorship tool used by a governing body that will not eventually face challenges that can defeat it, and they know it, except for chip implanted behavior modification, but that uh, oh, you want to put that where? Uh, no, I am not REALLY fond of that ear, AH AHHHHH!

Then you have to consider Triangle boy and it's ilk. The net is rife with circumvention tools! Take Peacefire for example.

I've sat in on a few "filtering the net" round table discussions in the recent past, and I can tell you that beyond disonnectiong the whole population from the net there is no censorship tool that will not be beaten by any governing body, and they know it.

Let's face it. I would expect that we would have an increase in the number of contests. or did it quickly get into areas that were just to obscure?

Well looking at recent bounties on, Client-end web filtering (ala Cyberpatrol, i.e. the nemisis of Peacefire), Embedded web servers, web-based database systems which users can login to and update

While they may not be on areas the average Joe knows about, I imagine anyone reading slashdot would at least have heard about the abovementioned areas.

No offense taken, but note what you've written is in fact much closer structurally to the true argument ad hominem. You've attempted to infer something about the truth of the statements from impolite aspects of them. That is, you've stated my some of my comments are "emotional words" or "political slant", etc. You haven't said they are false. Note the difference.

In fact, they are emotional, because I have very deep and complex associations here. It's a long story. But I'd defend what I wrote as accurate

Moreover, I would assert that a key part of the smear was that it was deliberate. It was not an innocent misquote. Declan McCullagh knows, e.g. Dave Farber. He (Declan) knows who he can ask for factual comments. Rather, the "story" was a deliberate fabrication, and Declan did his best to dismiss people who were "there" via published personal attacks.

Note the difference - Declan did not say that Vint Cerf and Robert Kahn were wrong, AND that the motive for their defense was that they were "Friends of Al". Rather, he dismissed what they said BECAUSE of that, which is classical ad hominem.

Consider the two propositions
1) Declan McCullagh wrote a false story
2) Declan McCullagh wrote the story because he's a Libertarian proselytizer

You are correct to note that #1 can be argued independently from #2. However, it would be incorrect to argue #1 is false because of #2 being argued. And #2 is relevant in itself, and should stand or fall on its own merits.

There really isn't a nice way to say someone wrote a political hatchet-job. But I'd say refusing to discuss that aspect does history a disservice.

Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)

peacefire.org (if you can get to it :) is a site that highlights the various shortcomings of censorware. They're constantly uncovering various sites being blocked for political reasons, and pushing for openness.

Most of the programs are sold as helping parents protect their kids. I'm a parent myself and I agree with peacefire; if any of these programs were protecting my kids, I'd want to know what they block and why so I can decide which package most closely matches what I would consider appropriate.

They're also their own best example; the peacefire site itself is blocked by most censorware.

OK it's not evidence, but it shows that the orignal assumption is probably justified.

A single lawsuit won't do anything to stop spam, but once fifty or one hundred people start suing, it will get too expensive for many spammers. In Washington State, we've nearly a dozen folks filing lawsuits, some of them going for some serious amounts -- to the tune of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.

If you've got spam with a phone number or ordering address in it, you can (usually) track it down to a specific company or person. If it's only got a URL, like those mortgage spams, Washington litigants are filling out the contact forms on the site, then going after the mortgage company that contacts them. When these mortgage companies get hit with a lawsuit, they either want to settle right quick, or they rat out the spammer they hired. I've been focusing on spam with phone numbers, as I find it relatively easy and fun to track down the company behind the number. It may not always be easy to find the spammer, but it's not rocket science either. Anyone can do it given a little bit of time.

The Seattle Times had a good article on Saturday about the anti-spam law, some folks who've been using it, their wins, and the troubles they've encountered with the court system. The biggest issue in Washington is that court clerks and judges aren't fully educated about procedural issues like whether one can sue an out-of-state defendant or for punitive damages in small claims court. (The answer to both is yes.) It's been pretty frustrating for us "trailblazers," as the judges are saying contradictory and often quite stupid stuff.

Here's some nifty links:

• AboutSpam.com - Bruce Miller's site
• Peacefire anti-spam suits - Bennett Haselton's site
• Smallclaim.info - my site

For a copy of my 24 page zine, Zen and the art of small claims, send some stamps to PO Box 95227, Seattle, WA 98145. You can also just read it online at my site, but any zinester knows that it's just not the same.

This guy is great. I remember peacefire.org from back in the day. He helped me fight a censorware install at the schools at which I was teaching. I wonder if he is still selling those groovy t-shirts.

In the case of decency standards, take the words "screw" and "fuck" -- which mean the same thing, but one of them is considered so harmful that films and CD's containing the word actually carry warning labels. "Fuck" is just a syllable -- the notion of what is considered a dirty word is completely arbitrary. When I was ten, I had an idea for solving the problem of "foul language" in movies: just declare that at midnight on the next January 1st, all swear words are reclassified as "slang" so they're not swear words any more.

The entire "Why we do this" page [rant :)] is quite interesting; well worth a read. Not like any of it would ever happen. :)

Verio is censoring John Gilmore's email under pressure from anti-spammers

But while they'll lobby and rally for all sorts of controls on this monster we call the world wide web, they'd never consider picking up and installing some parental control software.

Part of the reason is that "parental control software", also called "censorship software", really doesn't work particularly well. Information at PeaceFire - "It's not a crime to be smarter than your parents." Not only does filtering software not block many adult sites, it also blocks many non-adult sites. On top of that, the software can be disabled - Peacefire has instructions.

Readers may be interested in my anticensorware reports on the above topic, particularly

• http://sethf.com/anticensorware/bess/loophole.php - BESS's Secret LOOPHOLE (censorware vs. privacy & anonymity)
• http://sethf.com/anticensorware/smartfilter/greate stevils.php - SmartFilter's Greatest Evils - censorware & privacy/anonymity

See also, by Peacefire, http://peacefire.org/babelfish/ - BabelFish blocked by censorware

I'm going to be releasing much more anticensorware work in the near future, but it's not clear if it'll be accepted for consideration on Slashdot. This is in part due to the still-active issue of What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org), and the acrimony between myself and Slashdot editor Michael Sims. I'm trying to see if there is a way to work around that editorial abuse, but frankly I'm a programmer, not a diplomat.

-- Seth Finkelstein

Readers may be interested in my anticensorware reports on the above topic, particularly

• http://sethf.com/anticensorware/bess/loophole.php - BESS's Secret LOOPHOLE (censorware vs. privacy & anonymity)
• http://sethf.com/anticensorware/smartfilter/greate stevils.php - SmartFilter's Greatest Evils - censorware & privacy/anonymity

See also, by Peacefire, http://peacefire.org/babelfish/ - BabelFish blocked by censorware

I'm going to be releasing much more anticensorware work in the near future, but it's not clear if it'll be accepted for consideration on Slashdot. This is in part due to the still-active issue of What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org), and the acrimony between myself and Slashdot editor Michael Sims. I'm trying to see if there is a way to work around that editorial abuse, but frankly I'm a programmer, not a diplomat.

-- Seth Finkelstein

• I have a right to install software on my computer that alters the content i access and view in any way i want, as long as i have permission to view that content in some form.
• Third Voice has a right to maintain a database where people can comment on various URLs for purposes of commentary or critisism. The fact they display the comments on top of the webpages being commented on makes no difference*, as long as the customers are either clearly aware of what is original content and what is 3rdvoice content or have consented to having the content altered for them. (Yes, of course, the fact KaZaA customers were not fully aware of what it meant that TopText was being installed, or informed during the installation process what the yellow links would mean in future makes everything different, and makes the inclusion of TopText with the KaZaA program, whether legal or no, definitely immoral on the part of KaZaA.)

Yeah, like they've ever worried about blocking legitimate site for the web!

www.peacefire.org

Firethorn

I am not sure what you are talking about. This is really just a way of trying to automate the posting of class announcements, assignments, and the like. The main point of departure is that they are going to be adding attendance information, but if a kid is cutting classes the school would normally be contacting the home anyway. This is really just CRM applied to K-12.

I guess that you and the poster would rather that everyone have some kind of peacefire-approved reaction. Well just about everything that they say is right, and we should all be using our energy fighting off things like n2h2's selling off of student data or attempts by schools to overreach their authority in policing personal web sites. But this one is a non-issue for everyone except for that set of kids that don't believe that their parents should actually act like parents.

Peacefire wasn't caught in the cross fire, it moved into an IP range that was already blocked.
A quick glance at Steve Linfords www.spamhaus.org and Sapient Fridges Spamware vendor list gave me:
209.211.253.68 www.extractor-pro98.com
209.211.253.69 www.list-sorcerer.com
209.211.253.70 www.massmailer.com
209.211.253.71 www.bulkemailpeople.com
209.211.253.73 www.e-mailblaster.com
209.211.253.74 www.marketingmasters.com
209.211.253.84 www.bulkers.net
209.211.253.88 www.bulkbarn.com
209.211.253.89 www.web-promotions.com
209.211.253.139 www.firstlinesoft.com
209.211.253.169 www.peacefire.org
209.211.253.248 www.bulk-isp.com / www.bulk-isp.net etcetera.

Not really a nice region, is it?

N2H2 executives had no official position and privately opposed the legislation that made filtering mandatory in schools and libraries.

That is BULL SHIT! N2H2's CEO, Peter Nickerson, testified before Congress recommending that legislation be passed to require filtering in public schools.

Peacefire's Bennet Haselton wrote a great report about BESS (which links to the testimony) here: http://www.peacefire.org/amnesty-intercepted/.

You seem to have fallen asleep while typing that link and entered in a couple more characters.

Here, I'll post the correct one:
http://www.peacefire.org/error-rates/


kickin' science like no one else can,
my dick is twice as long as my attention span.

We've got a filter on sites "unsuitable for University access" and it is lame. For example any URL with the word "sluth" gets blocked because it contains "slut". The BESS software has been shown to be just as bad.

By convincing the judge / jurors / lawyers that "bad" websites harm children, you'll just set them up so they'll rule in favor of censorship next time around, "for the children."

A better idea is for kids to tell each other about PeaceFire, spread the word, and then try to reeducate their parents.

Kids: Sit down with your folks. SHOW them how the blocking software lets you find "bad" sites. SHOW them how it blocks you from harmless and educational sites.

If we can reeducate parents from this attitude of "my opinions are your opinions", maybe we can solve the problem. Cynical lawsuits may help the plaintiff, but they'll worsen this for everyone else. (Though I'd love to see the censorware companies take a hit as much as anyone else. =)

-Kasreyn

There is a piece on censorware.org that talks about some political campain sites being blocked

And you won't find any censorware reports on censorware.org these days. Michael Sims (yes, that Michael Sims, Slashdot YRO editor) shut-down the censorware.org site, in a failed coup d'etat to control Censorware Project. Some of the material is now on a different site, censorware.NET.

The history is given in my essay below. Michael Sims has taken to abusing his Slashdot editorial position, to downgrade my postings whenever I mention what he did. Maybe this'll slip through. It's worth burning the karma over it.

Note censorware.NET would also like Michael Sims to stop confusing people over the domain names. No luck so far.

Sig: My Latest Censorware Essay:
What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)

...is obtain and compile a list of sites that you may need to visit for research purposes (I'm sure many Bill Clinton sites are blocked that describe the premise of impeachment). Get a lot of sites on that list.

Then, start a petition. I don't suggest giving it to students, because the Big guys' response will be that of "yeah, of course the students want the censorware gone." Get teachers to sign it. Get librarians who have to explain to students why they are shown a "Bess can't go there" page when they want to get the information they need. Explain to them how N2H2 is selling out to advertisers the browsing habits of the school's students. Propose your petition and list to the school board, along with convincing arguments why any type of censorware is bad, and how it's just a replacement for proper supervision. Check out Peacefire for arguments against the most common censorware applications. Good luck to you, and I'd like to hear the outcome of your scenario, as I'm in the same situation with Bess.

The fact that this lovely proxy filters /. At least that's what I was experiencing the last couple of weeks. Asking the admin at my school didn't help a lot since BESS doesn't tell you why it blocks a certain site. CHeck out this link at http://www.peacefire.org/censorware/BESS/. What really sucks is the fact that it won't let you go to any sites like www.geocites.com where people can get free webspace. That filters a big part of the WWW right from the beginning. Freemail sites are blocked too. However it doesn't filter SSL secured Webpages. I tried to use a site like www.anonymizer.com to surf but it's blocked too.

• Not everyone has a PC at home (yes, I know it's a shock to much of the Slashdot community)
• Some parents put the same exact software on home computers
• Many schools force students to use the Internet at school for research, but the filtering software decreases the usability of the same Internet access
• Do you really want some company (out to make money above anything else) deciding what's "appropriate" or not?

Will they be doling out statistics regarding how many perfectly legitimate sites are being blocked out by their own software?
But I'm sure this information will be very valuable to the marketroids who haven't figured out that kids like Britney Spears and the Backdoor Boys.

You forgot to mention that all (or almost all?) filtering software vendors have skewed political biases which blocks legitimate protected speech. It is censorship of political speech.

Check out Peacefire.org. Check out EFF.

Porn viewing at libraries is not a huge problem. Yes, some people do it occasionally, but who does this really hurt? Why shouldn't they be able to view it? The only answer I keep hearing is that "other people" walking by might be offended if they looked at the monitor. So, what then, I guess if I want to read something, say, D.H. Lawrence or Henry Miller, I'd better make sure that no one can read over my shoulder, because, on the off chance that it might offend them, I can't read anything in public?

Why not set up the computers so that they respect the privacy of the user? People use the internet to look up sensitive/personal/private information and correspondence at times. Why should other people walking by easily be able to read that information on the screen, when it is intended for that person only?

People should be able to regulate the content they view by their own choice, not by what someone sitting over their shoulder thinks is "inappropriate" or "offensive".

These "solutions" not only won't work, but aren't needed.

I rang, you rang, we all rang for orangutang!

Minors may not use unfiltered computers with Internet access, even if a parent gives permission or a teacher deems the site to be wrongly filtered.

You're kidding me.

You're not kidding me?

Wonderful way to protect censorware companies from having to actually update their lists. Also a rather interesting removal of individual power from parents and teachers. I guess a lot of bleating about "giving educational choice back to the parents" only extends as far as where parents can spend their money, not what their children can look at, even when the filtering software is clearly wrong in the eyes of the adults involved.

"My son needs to look up 2600.com for a project on hackers." "My daughter is doing a research project on breast cancer." "Why can't I see any sites about Wicca? I'm doing a project for religion class." Legitimate queries, all of which under law can only be met with, "I'm sorry, but I can't shut down the filter."

Consider that many filters not only try to block sexual pornography, but often sites about other religions, left- and sometimes right-wing political philosophies, gay and lesbian sites, peacefire.org, and anything else that doesn't fit the political agenda of the software company's target market. Fortunately, some (most?) filters allow the degree of blocking to be tailored, but how often will the administrator in a library or school be knowledgable enough to not just block everything out of worry or paranoia?

Yeah, it'll scare off the porn jockeys, but they can just claim to be looking up something else and have the filters turned off anyway. Not to mention intelligent, knowledgable students (the existence of which I'm sure will be considered dangerous to the public good, since they tend to know realfacts, not goodfacts) who already know how to get around filters will do so, and probably get accused of "hacking" by teachers who should know better.

If I were an American resident, I'd already have sent off some rather long letters to representatives about this moronic law, and I'd send a comment to the FCC now telling them software should not be implemented in taxpayer-funded facilities. that serves to restrict political and religious freedom. Find a filter that blocks only pornography, or recommend that filters be set only to block sex and extreme violence (and hope the latter doesn't block sites about the horrors of the Holocaust). Of course, I'd love to say "don't follow the law at all, it's badly-conceived", but I somehow doubt it would be taken seriously.

DMCA, UCITA, CIPA - government of the people, for the people?

I was mercilessly flamed for daring to suggest that parents become involved in their children's activities on the 'net. I was seen as accusing someone of bad parenting because I had the gall to suggest practical solutions over commercial snake-oil.

Given this attitude, I would imagine this rule will fairly sail through the rule-making process. We certainly can't have parents taking on the responsibility of monitoring their kids on the web, or even instilling in them the moral values necessary to differentiate between what parents consider to be acceptable and unacceptable content.

1) The people who should be advocates for library users (library boards and staff) lack spines;

2) The poor, who depend on libraries for their web access, don't contribute to political campaigns.

Case in point: Memphis/Shelby County Public Library resisted installing filters for years(well, at least a couple), until a local archconservative anti-pr0n crusader, your stereotypical suburban soccer mom basically, was elected to the county commission. Somehow, she ended up on a budget committee, and threatened to cut the county's contribution to the library system by 25%--some $4M--if they didn't install filters, which they wasted no time whatsoever doing. Never mind that the library has otherwise successfully resisted responsibility(or, more to the point, liability) for babysitting children, including allowing the little varmints access to Playboy and The Joy of Sex. Never mind Peacefire. Never mind that this latter-day Comstock represents a district where most households have their own computers(and do you think that Dick and Jane are even slowed down by the filter that Mommy put on the family PC? Doubt it!), whereas most of the people actually affected by this decision live in the inner city. Point is, libraries are a big, slow-moving target for social conservative politicians looking for an easy score, which is to say, all of them.

The thing that gets me is that so many of these people, who are otherwise more than enthusiastic about homeschooling and free exercise of their religion and so on, are so insistent on the public library being responsible for enforcing morality. They just don't get it that the only filter that works is what they teach their kids regarding right and wrong--no, not what they tell their kids, but what they can make their kids believe.

i was in a radioshack the other day. they had computers set up with some sort of broadband net access. and cyber patrol to filter out all the smut.

i try to load the peacefire webpage. it's blocked. no surprise there. so i try to load www.goatse.cx. it's not blocked.

i left it open, so the customers have something to think about, then left.
--

So, Porn isn't what's at issue here...

Any school (or public) librarian walking around the school (or public) library could easily notice big, glowing, 32-bpp, 1024x768 Naked People on a monitor... And if they don't want porn, that's what Acceptable Use Policies are for. Little Johnny gets caught downloading fake Britney Spears porn when he's supposed to be researching the French Alps, and Johnny gets detention, or a phone call home, or loses access privileges temporarily... Fine.

Censorware raises a different issue. Who decides which software is used? should a fundamentalist school librarian, or, for that matter, principal, be able to decide that the software that blocks plannedparenthood.org and pflag.org, but maybe misses some of the borderline sites that many would consider "hate speech" ?

If nothing else, censorware is unreliable. Websites come and go too quickly to maintain useful blocked-sites lists, and filtering is too stupid to block porn sites and still allow sites that detail the mating habits of the blue-footed booby.

The fact that Peacefire has released its one-click disabling software demonstrates the severity of the situation: for the entire time it has existed, (five years, I think) Peacefire has refused to distribute hacks/cracks/etc. to get past censorware, rather emphasizing grassroots efforts to prevent the use of blocking software.Until now.

This is just going to make things worse... what happens when a nosy librarian starts checking out the logs of failed attempts to access 'restricted sites?'
When 'Little Johnny's' user account shows up on 56 failed attempts to access sites that offer support to gay or questioning teens, who's there to protect his privacy from the school administrators in the small bible-belt town where he lives?

Many of the benefits of the internet may be jeopardized by censorware. When the net is free, everyone is connected. Building walls goes against the nature of the net. Many networks could be more secure if we didn't mind losing the level of connectivity unfettered internet access gives us. But that's something not many people are willing to give up. I'm not. And functionality demands that the net be allowed to exist without regulation or interference.

• It's not actually an official law until President Clinton signs it.
• The very same day that the president signed COPA into law, the ACLU filed a suit against it (and they've been winning so far).
• CIPA is different from COPA and CDA though, in many ways. One of the main differences is that COPA and CDA were criminal statutes, bound by stricter due-process considerations. CIPA is just an incentive-based "suggestion", similar to the 55mph thing, and so it's not bound by constitutional considerations as much.
• This law has been introduced 9 times over the past two years, all by Republicans.
• The American Library Association strongly opposes such a law.

• A general perception exists that Internet filtering is seriously flawed and in many situations unusable. It is also perceived that schools and libraries don't want filtering. These notions are naive and based largely on problems associated with earlier versions of client-based software that are admittedly crude and ineffective. Though some poor filtering products still exist, filtering has gone through an extensive evolution and is not only good at protecting children but also well-received and in high demand.

You can find the relevant software here. It's about 135k to download. It also only runs under Win98.

The Free ODMG Project needs volunteers.

I was actually looking forward to the new domains. I thought they would create some good ones that might be worth using. I find these new ones to be most illogical, however. Except for .biz and .pro, they are all over three letters! Judging from how unsuccessful .us has been due to its long extensions (see nic.us to see how long they are; domainname.city.state.us), you would think that they'd learn. What about .web? And how about .porn or .xxx, which would finally make it easy to create filters that didn't have large rates of misblocking pages while not blocking all pages that they are supposed to (see peacefire.org)? I could have done a better job than them and I'm just a teenager.

The whole point of this was to get rid of the congestion that has overtaken .com, .net, and .org. There is no way that creating extensions that only apply to a small percentage of people will work. We need to get rid of this appointed web authority.

If you actually think high school students have the right to free speech in this country, you need to do some reading. They don't have any sort of right to speech, privacy, press, etc at least within school... and possibly even outside it.

In Massachusetts, where I live, students right to free speech in public schools is protected by state law. I got hassled by the administration a few times for the alternative newspaper I ran for two years, but after they talked to a competent attorney, they decided to leave me alone. The only person who persisted in harassing me and my staff nearly got fired for it, ended up retiring as advisor of the official school newspaper, and was forced to write a formal appology to one of my staffers.

I'm not saying this is a good thing - in fact I think it's a terrible thing - but that's the way it is right now. And since no one really cares about teenagers' rights except teenagers, that's probably the way it will stay.

I care about teenager's rights even though I haven't been a teenager for years. And the folks over at peacefire care too. The only real danger lies in students who actually accept the fallacy that they have no rights.

Wouldn't it make sense to also consider the percentage of unblocked pornographic sites?

I asked Bennett Haselton (of Peacefire) the same question. He replied by mail (8/5/2000):

Bennett Haselton wrote:

The information is not intended to persuade people who support censorship because by that age people generally don't change their mind anyway. The information is to help people such as librarians who are embattled in their local community because they don't censor Internet access on their computers.

If we focus on the fact that blocking software doesn't block enough pornography, then we're betraying our cause because part of the point of what we're doing is that pornography is not harmful. Now, how do you persuade people to believe *that*, if they already have formed the belief that porn is harmful? I don't think you can, which is why we have the censorware-disabling instructions on our site; you can't reason with parents not to use the software, so we can at least give people a means to get around it...

-Bennett

In fact, judges typically decide court cases because of what is wrongfully blocked, rather than because not enough material was censored.

(PS: Sorry for posting private email, but I think that Bennett would approve)

As a parent, I at first had some real trouble with this issue. I would not let my child surf the net totally unsupervised at home. I don't want him meeting pedophiles in chat rooms or (much more likely) seeing pictures of Cartman's mom in a german schiza mpeg. So why would I want him to be able to see that kind of stuff unsupervised at the library? Filtering sounds so great in theory: keep out the bad stuff, but let the good stuff through automatically!

The problem is that the implementation can't match the promise. Filtering software lets tons of "bad" stuff through. Having it there doesn't keep pornography out. It only keeps some pornography out. So it really only gives parents a false sense of security. If I didn't understand the limitations of the software, I might let my kid go to the library and surf to his heart's content, not realizing that he still has access to a lot of stuff I don't want him to see. I have to be prepared for the fact that he may be viewing stuff I don't approve of at the library, whether it has software filters or not. I have to have the same vigilance that I have when he visits friends. I have to spend time with my kid, make sure we have open communication, and that he feels he can discuss difficult subjects with me. It puts a burden on me to be a good parent.

And then there is the issue of who decides what is "bad". It's been shown, by groups like peacefire, that filtering software blocks a lot of stuff it shouldn't. It blocks health sites, political sites, sites of people or places whose names sounds dirty (like Cockburn, or Middlesex), sites of people who are critical of the filtering software company. Looking at the whole package, the problems outweigh the benefits.

I remember seeing this piece of software that could actually block images based on the amount of skin tones in it.

It's an extremely stupid algorithm. To illustrate why, let's first describe a proper use of the technique.

The idea is to histogram the colors in the image. For example, consider the image of a cherry. It will have peak colors in the reds but very few colors elsewhere. Now, what if that cherry was bruised? It will have two peaks, one at red and one at brown. That's how we can classify a cherry as "good" or "bruised" when it rolls past our camera.

That's a fine solution to such a simple problem. However, how can you take any arbitrary image off the 'net and classify it as "porn" or "non-porn"? We can't even count the number of people in the photograph.

Unfortunately, such stupid algorithms such as keyword filtering and flesh-tone counting are typical of the industry. The task requires better than the best Artificial Intelligence available, yet vendors make absurd claims about their effectiveness and reliability. They lie about their products to politicians who are under pressure to fight smut regardless of how bad the software is. Even if you agree that filters must be forcefully imposed upon libraries (most librarians will fight them), then the actual products are hopelessly inadequate for the task. For more information, visit peacefire.org.

I think this would be a good idea but don't know if there's anyone with the resources to undertake the task. If you could make a business out of it, like maybe Enonymous' Privacy Ratings site, then that might work. I'd monitor it if there was such a site. Maybe someone would want to run something like FuckedCompany.Com but concentrate on slippery privacy practices.

I've found that PrivacyDigest and WebVeil do a pretty good job of keeping abreast of the news. Privacy Digest is better because it is more comprehensive, but WebVeil is selective, seeming to focus on privacy for consumers specifically rather than everything that is privacy under the sun. Otherwise, I just pay attention to and filter what the paranoids are saying in alt.privacy or check on the privacy issues section of Yahoo and Wired.

1. there is an Internet Explorer exploit that allows any website to
2. any cookie on your machine.

1. Multiple people may use the same computer.

(a) Secure and unable to shop (with 1 - click)

(b) Unsecure and have script kiddies able to shop (with my credit card).

Hmmm. what a choice.... Steve Jobs - well done!

It doesn't matter what we want. They're not going to listen. Take a look at some of the sites that have been blocked by CYBERsitterCyber Patrol. They willingly censor certain sites that do not match their own political criteria -- not ours. None of these kinds of censoreware products will replace good parenting...

It doesn't matter what we want. They're not going to listen. Take a look at some of the sites that have been blocked by CYBERsitterCyber Patrol. They willingly censor certain sites that do not match their own political criteria -- not ours. None of these kinds of censoreware products will replace good parenting...

Even filtering advocates should be appalled at the actual practices of the industry. See peacefire.org for more analysis of filtering software.

Don't forget the wonderful censorware.org site. This is what we recommend to parents. Peacefire has more of a "how dare they lock me out!" mentality.

Censorware has a "Look what doesn't work to protect your children" mentality.

In either case, my husband and I ended up getting a Sunday editorial spot in our local paper on the school library and censorware issue. (It doesn't carry editorials past day one, so there is no link to place here.) This is a case where the technologically literate need to do a few simple things to fight censorware.

1. Write letters to the editor of all local papers. Include facts. Hammer on the facts. Hammer on pages that do get banned, and pages that slip through. censorware.org's review of bess contains excellent ammunition.
2. When discussing censorware with the community, make sure your language and affect are similar to that of a Baptist Sunday School teacher. Show deep concern, explain that these things don't work, express dismay at this abrogation of parental and community responsibility, and do it without frothing at the mouth.
3. Do not use ad hominem arguments. (What would you expect coming from an ignorant slob like that?) Instead, be the voice of sweet reason and responsibility. Explain the wonders that can no longer be seen. Blocks flesh tones? No more Sistine Chapel Ceiling. Uses keywords? No more Testicular cancer. Uses algorithms? No more information on the Brotherhood of Flagellants. If all else fails, use
4. Indignation. How dare anyone decide what your child gets to see? Who appointed them the ultimate decider of your child's upbringing? What standards shall be used?
5. Bring up community standards. Communities are changing so rapidly that the demographic standards obscenity have changed. In many cultures, the pictures of astronauts in shorts at NASA is offensive to modesty. In other cultures, the human body is something to be celebrated. Shall I assume that the female breast is taboo, as in Baptist Illinois, or shall I be like the folk on Pago Pago and forbid the display of female thighs, and the discussion of bodily function between father and son?
6. Finally, if necessary, in public debate, ask how much time they spend watching TV with children, reading the books their children read, and providing other outlets. Remind the audience that the Internet has never been a substitute for parenting. Remind the audience of the evils of using the public library as a babysitter. If parents do not trust their own children, have them watch their children, rather than forcing us to do it for them.

First of all, I don't think that porn needs to be blocked. Perhaps some sites may cause real harm (internet gambling?), but the damage done by porn is theoretical and unproven. Do the obscure "benefits" of blocking justify the cost of purchasing, deploying, and maintaining the software?

With that in mind, I hope that none of the current batch of crapware gets proliferated in any more libraries. They frequently block good sites because of poor AI and because of the inherent difficulty in the decision-making task.

Let's look at three main methods of blocking to see why they don't work:

• An Access Control List
  Human operators simply cannot filter all of the sites (despite censorware claims to the contrary). Either censorware has to miss much of the content that they deem "offensive", or they must filter using some automated procedure. The result is that many censorware products blacklist sites based on an algorithm without any human supervision. The algorithms are typically keyword matches (in one example, the presence of the word "couples" in the URL blocked out a harmless photo of Al Gore and Tipper).
• Keyword filtering
  This frequent technique has less intelligence than plankton. They do not use state-of-the-art AI algorithms to parse language. Their methods are crude and arbitrary. However, that doesn't stop vendors from making exhorbitant claims about their intelligence, as if a real nanny was protecting childeren while they surf.
• Image processing
  My experience with computer vision and pattern recognition suggests that cutting-edge technology is nowhere near distinguishing between pr0n and non-pr0n. How can you tell an innocent dance from a vile sex scene? How do even count the number of people in the photograph? One vendor claims to be able to interpret images (by counting the flesh-tones) to decide whether they are pornographic. Of course, all independent reviews of the software reveal it their algorithm to be complete arbitrary (they can only block 30% of pr0n by blocking 30% of the internet). Mostly, it just blocked people's faces.

In summary, censorware is not much more than cheap introductory-level AI with a lot of marketing hype. Why would we install this crap at the risk of undermining parental authority? Kids will not learn to respect authority by being forced to swallow such stupid and arbitrary protectionist measures.

Furthermore, the whole system reeks of abuse caused by deliberate blocking. Athiest, feminist, and gay newsgroups are frequently targeted. Sites that criticize censorship are often targetted. Remember when CyberSitter threaten to block out all sites on Peacefire's ISP unless the ISP yanked Peacefire's site (for criticizing CyberSitter and showing how lame it was)? Access control lists and blocking algorithms are kept secret, presumably to prevent the competition from improving their filtering product. However, I think that they must disguise their poor algorithms and abusive practices.

Even filtering advocates should be appalled at the actual practices of the industry. See peacefire.org for more analysis of filtering software.

So please don't let your solution include a blocking filter.

The obligatory link to Peacefire. Founder Bennett Haselton usually shows up when a library is under attack to argue against immediately reaching for blocking software.

How ironic that the first release of Internet Explorer to fix the cookie exploit contains another privacy issue along the same lines.

It makes you wonder if Microsoft was really trying to fix the problem or just alter it in a way they had hoped would go unnoticed.