Slashdot Mirror
The Breaking of Cyber Patrol 4
Their announcement:
"March 11, 2000 - ANNOUNCEMENT
Cyber Patrol(R) 4, a "censorware" product intended to prevent users from accessing undesirable Internet content, has been reverse engineered by youth rights activists Eddy L O Jansson and Matthew Skala. A detailed report of their findings, titled "The Breaking of Cyber Patrol(R) 4", with commentary on the reverse engineering process and cryptographic attacks against the product's authentication system, has been posted on the World Wide Web at this address:
http://hem.passagen.se/eddy1/reveng/cp4/cp4break.html
The abstract of the report:
Several attacks are presented on the "sophisticated anti-hacker security" features of Cyber Patrol(R) 4, a "censorware" product intended to prevent users from accessing Internet content considered harmful. Motivations, tools, and methods are discussed for reverse engineering in general and reverse engineering of censorware in particular. The encryption of the configuration and data files is reversed, as are the password hash functions. File formats are documented, with commentary. Excerpts from the list of blocked sites are presented and commented upon. A package of source code and binaries implementing the attacks is included.
Eddy L O Jansson
srm_dfr@hotmail.com
http://hem.passagen.se/eddy1/index.html
Matthew Skala
mskala@ansuz.sooke.bc.ca
http://www.islandnet.com/~mskala/"
I always feel reverse engineering is good. If people who don't do this for a living can break your code or encryption and solve how your program works, then you need much better encryption. It also means that if they could do it, there's a good chance the government could have done it as well.
However, we've seen that corporate America *HATES* this kind of check. Will we see legal action against the authors, and have the program stripped from the internet? Could the DMCA be used again as leverage?
I say, let's do the DeCSS all over again. Spread the program. Mirror away. Mirror in other countries. *FORCE* these people to redo their encryption, or change the method their software works.
Flat out censorware has been proven not to work effectively. Instead, make it more dynamic with checks in the program. I hope the information they found will prove to the people already trying to pass legislation to force libraries and other public computers to use similar programs, that such an action will do nothing to prevent what they're hoping.
This is way off topic, but why the ugly brown colour scheme? Does it have any significance, or did someone skip a character somewherewhen coding the HTML?
-Markus
(rest of the post, though a perfect example of what I'm talking about, not quoted)
No, Skippy, it doesn't, not anymore than a Tooth Fairy actually brought you cash for your lost baby molars.
And you're telling him to get a sense of proportion and to quit grandstanding and stop acting like a kid.
Either you're a troll or the biggest hypocrite I've seen in a long time.
Censorware may not be perfect, but ... it is the only vehicle we have for preventing the corruption of our children through the Internet.
How correct you are.
We must make a stand in preserving our nation, and censorware is one of the ways we can do this.
Yes. We cannot let the forces of ignorance, intolerance, conservatism, and Christianity take over our great nation. I would be horrified if I found that my child had been browsing a fundamentalist Christian website -- who knows what kind of terrible, insidious, corrosive ideas she could have picked up? I'm glad to see that there are other parents out there who can see the issues clearly.
One nitpick:
Giving reasons helps also. "Don't do drugs because drugs are for losers. Every person I grew up with who started doing drugs in HS is either dead or working the takeout at McDonalds."
This is a reason? It's anecdotal evidence. This would have just started me looking to see if I could find more information and ways to find out (and possibly experiment) for myself. Point me at a few good objective studies instead, please.
I do drugs and I've been looking at hardcore porn since before puberty. I also have a Master's degree from one of the top universities in the world and an extremely well-paying and satisfying job. I am a productive member of society and I have no more trouble with relationships than the typical person of above-average intelligence. Any attempts to "shelter" me as a kid only pissed me off and were easily circumvented. Kids aren't harmed by seeing nudie pictures. If anything, they are harmed by being taught that nudie pictures are something "dirty" and "bad" to which they must be denied access at all costs.
http://www.now.org/issues/abortion/
And just think how much they will learn, when they reach 10 or 11 years of age, and discover debuggers and reverse assemblers. I can just picture those little boys, scribbling strings of hex numbers on pads and studying the Intel instruction set, working like beavers. And then--bingo!--the administrator password, and unlimited access to the 'net. I think they're entitled to all the p0rn they want after that...
Children are inherently vulnerable and early exposure to such disturbing material such as pornography, gay rights or sexually transmitted diseases can scar them for life, making it far harder for them to grow up to become fine upstanding people with a good Christian decency.
...
The Australian government is obviouly more concerned with the growth and morality of their nation's children than with such modern illusions as "free speech" and "equal rights". Such things only get in the way of the happiness of society in the long-term.
My god... that's the most brilliant parody I have ever read. It deserves at least a (Score 4: Funny)
I left a few other things out.
http://www.now.org/issues/harass/clin ton.html
http://www.now.org/issues/right/index.ht ml
http://www.now.org/issues/lgbi/index.html
The Nazis didn't claim to be Christian, and in fact (IIRC), a lot of the top ones were pagans of some kind. Tell that to Eric Raymond the next time he starts emitting idiotic, uninformed generalizations about socialists
Most American fascists, of course, have always been drawn to Christianity. Most of Hitler's and Mussolini's sympathizers in the USA in the 1930's were Christians (Father Coughlin, Charles Lindbergh, etc.), and God knows we've got Christian Identity and friends now. Don't forget the World Church of the Creator, though; they're not even remotely Christian.
Nobody gains from oversimplifying these things.
THEN SHUT UP...We do not want to hear your meaningless poorly thought out dribble. There is no right more worth protecting. Haul me to the gallows but allow me my last words....Give me liberty of give me death....Those words ring truer today than ever, the enemy has given up the frontal assualt and is now sneaking behind our backs everyminute of everyday....The price of freedom is eternal vigilance....
Get a clue the moderation system PRESERVES free speach not the other way around. You can alter your threshold to see ANY COMMENT not matter how stupid..I even SAW yours
Drugs are a thing just like your computer, whether you turn into a script kiddie/cracker or not is up to you, your upbringing and parental guidance, but just like security through obscurity does not work neither does raising your kids in ignorance. There is no PAT answer only LOVE RESPECT and TRUTH. Things which NO GOVERNment, or CORPORATION have the slightest understanding of.....
you may not realize it but many many successful people out in the world have used or are still using drugs. it's not about if you use them, but how responsable you are about using them.
i occasionaly smoke pot or drop e, and i am not working at mcdonalds. in fact i taught myself to program when i was 15 and have made a shitload of shareware and made quite a living for myself. i've been using linux since 1996, i am currently a network administrator. i just turned 19 a few weeks ago..
just because you don't hear about business men being busted by cops for doing drugs, doesn't mean that they don't. it's because they are responsable and smart enough not to do anything stupid or let it interfier with their lives. or even let people other than their friends know about it.
i can honestly say that i haven't had a job where at least some of my fellow employees have never used or are still using drugs on a recreatonal basis. you just have to get to know someone first before you assume that they don't..
posting ac for obvious reasons..
That's how we get Ted Bundy types...
It only took me two minutes to find this picture. But censorship wouldn't help me, it would just make me think the clown is not out there when in fact he is. My ignorance would make me more vulnerable. Please pray for me in church this weekend.
This is off topic, but I wanted to thank you for your rationality, and responsible parenting. I'm glad to see someone take responsibility for their children, rather than begging it off to the government. We need more people like this, especially in the government, to bring a rational view point to a bunch of people too technically and morally illiterate to deal with it themselves.
And, no, I'm not being sarcastic.
Is this naked couple harmful to our children?
It's a naked couple engaged in sexual activity. Of course it's pornographic! I guess you're one of those people who lie to themselves, pretending that if photos are black and white they "must be art" and so on.
You should know better, and I'm horrified to find that somebody like you is entrusted with raising children. They'll end up in jail, and I'll be paying taxes to support them -- unless I'm the one they shoot. In that case I guess you'll have won.
Why would a site like The National Organization for Women be blocked?
I left a few other things out.
http://www.now.org/issues/harass/clin ton.html
http://www.now.org/issues/right/index.html
http://www.now.org/issues/lgbi/index.html
This just shows what hypocrite you are. Why you didn't complain when every fucking TV station was broadcasting Clinton's 'testimony', which is worst than half of the pornos I've seen in my life?
Ah, noooo... All these sites are 'disgusting', but Clinton's testimony is just fine...
Pathetic!
== opinion != whining
i don't see a problem with software for parents to keep their kids out of porn sites and what not, but i don't think that ISPs need to enforce it on their customers. i also think that many people make too much of a deal over "free speech" and such to a point where the debate becomes very ludicrous in nature.
== criticism == whining
I'm a hypocrite how? I'm not protesting NOW, I just wouldn't want my kids looking at propaganda like that. I would consider their inclusion in blocking software no different then someone blocking white supremacist propaganda. As for Clinton's testimony being worse then half the pornos you have seen, damn dude, you need to find better pornos.
Cyberpatrol was developed under the auspices of the ADL. The ADL was shown to be an intelligence and propaganda arm of the Israeli government. They regularly spy for the Mossad. The objectionable content they're going to filter is **US***. Do an Altavista search, if you think I'm lying.
They were caught by the FBI and San Francisco PD and the matter was in the U.S. District Courts in California for years. They were busted redhanded with 12,000 files on American citizens and organizations just in California (1993). Funny, we didn't see it on ABC or CNN. Again, do an Altavista search, you'll read all about it.
Get a clue, no ISP in australia forces their clients to use blocking software.
Just look at your Free to air tv in american, cant even show anything, but here in austarlia, they show full uncensored Supranos at 1030pm with all swearing on freetoair tv.
Well censorware only stops a small fraction of the porn on the net.. and it dose not help you catch the people who are doing it so you can ask them to leave. Also, it dose nothing to stop people from playing jokes on people with porn backgrounds or open web browser windows. I think we are better off without the false sence of security that censorware brings. Let librarians deal with it as human beings.
As an adult Aussie, I object to the Governments attempts to censor what I see.
Then again, someone subscribed me to a porn mailing list as a joke, and I didnt want that. I wouldnt want my seven year old to experience that either.
Sigh, Damned if I do, and Damned if I dont. Short of having a deny everything firewall at home what answer do I have?
Haven't you ever seen a horror movie? I'm firmly opposed to the use of ectoplasm in raising children.
(Score:-1,Surreal)
This is definitely how you should approach it as a parent. But one problem with relying totally on that is that you cannot be there at all times that your child may need or want to use the internet. That's just one reason why I support the use of the blocking software.
That is nothing at all like the way Google works.
I see a problem with it - if, for some reason, the parents decide their children should not do that, they should raise and teach their children not to do it. They should NOT use software, if they have to, they are incompetent as parents and shouldn't really have kids if the first place...
I have a feeling that Mattel really is behaving unacceptably in this matter! But what if I'm wrong?
... wants to hear from you! Call them, write to them, e-mail them! Let them know what they can do to better serve you, their (potential) customer!
:)
:
As a potential Cyber Patrol customer, I am sure that they would be more than happy to entertain an intensive dialogue with me (via phone and e-mail) in order so that I can better understand why it is that I should not know what sites their product will prevent me from seeing and why they are abusing the legal system in an attempt to supress customer-benefiting Consumer Reports-style reviews and analyses of their products.
During my lunch hour, I will call their Tech. Support dept. so I can get their side of the issue, and express my side. Who knows... I might even have to ask to speak with a "supervisor" (and perhaps even the supervisor's supervisor). If I can think of something to say to them tomorrow that I hadn't thought of today, then I will call them again. And so on.
Tonight, when I arrive home, I will send the company an e-mail. If and when they reply, I will send them another e-mail, responding to their points and adding any additional ones of my own. (And if they do not reply I will of course e-mail them to enquire as to whether or not they received my original e-mail). And so on. I think that it would mean a lot to them to know that I cared enough about their company and its product to want to get into a long-term e-mail Pen Pal-esque relationship with the company and its employees.
As as an added convenience -- that is to save them the trouble of having to Xerox(tm) duplicate paper copies of my enquiries for their files, I will send a fax version of each of my e-mails as well.
I will take advantage, so to speak, of Mattel's open invitation for me to submit recomendations for sites to be blocked via a website application (http://www.cyberpatrol.com/forms/lists ub.asp) by using this interface to pose press-conference style questions such as: Why does Mattel insult the good faith of its customers by making additions to its ``CyberLISTS'' for purely political reasons?
I assume that if they had wanted this form interface to strictly support only the transmission of URL's (and not insightful questioning) they would have programmed out the polymorphism that permits the latter.
Mattel has a corporate interest to serve the customer. And that's why I am sure that they would be most appreciative if YOU, humble Slashdot Reader, were to likewise contact them in order to let them know that you are interested in finding out more about how their software works and to express to them that it not acceptable for them to pad their list of blocked sites merely for the sake of corporate censorship.
Mattel / Microsystems / The Learning Company
They will thank you for it!
--------------------------------From the cyberpatrol website (http://www.cyberpatrol.com/central)
If you're looking for support on your Cyber Patrol product, please contact:
Cyber Patrol technical support at (319) 247-3333 Monday thru Friday, 9am to 9pm EST,
or email help@tlcsupport.com, fax 319-395-9600,
or mail The Learning Company 1700 Progress Drive P.O. Box 100 Hiawatha, IA 52233-0100
-----------------------------
P.S. If using the website interface (http://www.cyberpatrol.com/forms/lists ub.asp) to pose your questions (instead of URLs)is the only convenient way for you to contact Mattel, I am sure that they will understand. The important thing, as I am sure they would heartily agree, is to get the communications flowing! Let's make contact!
(resorting to the vernacular for clarity of meaning)
... And your litte dog, too!...
Bite me, ya mealy-mouthed aussie bastard. Your kiddies are YOUR problem.
- yours, etc.
Ibid Yellowbelly
I know what I am about to say goes against the grain of /. thinking which is why this comment is being posted as an AC - the first time I have felt the need to do so.
/. are still at school or college and don't have kids of their own - and as such their comments on this issue are uninformed and arrogant.
/. to agree with me, even if they don't say so for fear of being labelled "fascists" or "nazis" by the younger members of /.s readership.
I know how you feel.
However let's face it, most of the people who read
Oh, I know exactly what you mean. There are so many people here who are completely unfamiliar with the challenges of raising a child.
When, one day, who finally have children you will understand that censorware is not wrong, it is in fact the only solution that will allow you to bring up your children in a moral way without polluting them with the filth that makes up most of the Internet.
I agree completely.
Children are inherently vulnerable
Yes, and this is why they need to be protected from growing up Christian. Growing up Christian can really hold you back later in life, and it gives you a very warped view of the world. But yes, without censorware, how can I be assured that my children won't see anything defamatory about a gay or lesbian lifestyle? There are so many destructive lies about homosexuality on the Internet that I don't want my kids seeing. And what if they get the idea that sex is dirty and shouldn't be talked about? How will they ever learn about its joys and dangers then? They can't be allowed to see anything at all that might give them this idea and make them less willing to learn.
However I believe in the Internet and want my children to be able to access all of the wonderful educational information that it contains
I am with you completely.
and I expect those few parents here on
You have my full support.
You're right -- we can't let our children grow up with intolerant, Christian, anti-homosexual, sex-ignorant lifestyles and attitudes. To do so would be doing irreparable harm to them and our society.
Censorware may not be perfect, but nothing under Heaven is. As such, it is the only vehicle we have for preventing the corruption of our children through the Internet. You seem to be advocating free access to pornography for children - as such you are at best misguided and at worst a tool of the liberal forces that would destroy our great nation, which has been a bastion of morality until recently. The rise of things like the Internet and the insistance by liberal child-haters that Christianity be destoryed through the use of the Devil's tools such as evolution is what is bringing the US to its knees.
Whereas once our great nation was the shining beacon of morality illumating the evils of the world today it is becoming as degenerate as anywhere else. We must make a stand in preserving our nation, and censorware is one of the ways we can do this.
I started looking at nekked pictures when I was a wee lad of only 12 or 13 (downloaded from a BBS). Well today, at 23 I am almost addicted to sex! I sometimes crave sex upwards of 2-3 times a WEEK.. if I can't find my partner then invariably I am left masturbating to Victoria's Secret catalogs. I feel ashamed and know 90% of the rest of the male population isn't like this. I'm sure it was the porn at a young age that turned me into a perverted freak. If only we had had this type of censorware back then I might be a good upstanding citizen working in a church or on a bible retreat. Now I am relegated to the bowels of the world... networking. :-( SAVE THE CHILDREN! Don't let them view porn or they will grow up to be adults and want to have SEX! It is disgusting. There are times when I wish I would have just cut my own penis off as a child.. then god wouldn't hate me anymore.
And what about Peacefire? What about the rights of that site's authors, which you so easily dispose of? Cyberpatrol is representing Peacefire as pornographic, violent or obscene by blocking them. Isn't this slander? Your arguement is that it shouldn't matter since kids aren't the core audience. Seeing basic rights disposed of in such a cavalier manner for the sake of convenience or business demographics gives me the chills.
Congratulations! You are now eligible to become the next Digital Millenium Copyright Act martyr! You have bypassed a device that protects access to a copyrighted work (the blocklists). Well, the DMCA is something American. The guys who did this are Canadian and Swedish - I happen to know the Swedish guy. OK, I'm no lawyer, but don't you have to be in America in order to break an American law?
This is amazing... People 'protecting' CyberPatrol and similar sh*tty software...
Kids? Do you *really* care about kids? Do you *really* think that CyberPatrol and similar crap protects KIDS?
Take a walk...
Tell me what you see? Whores on the corner, gangs on the street, dirt everywhere. Pornos in the windows, sex on the street, blood on the walls...
Turn on the TV - tell me what you see? Wars, 'special reports' about some accident where XY people died, nude people in every movie...
Go to school - tell me what you see? Drugs, violence. Kids torturing other kids.
And kids also see all those things.
And you are WORRIED about someone reverse engineering CyberPatrol?!
You, sir, are complete idiot.
Every fu*ker is using word 'kids' for political reasons, but they don't give a *shit* about kids. Kids are just a TOOL. It is a shame, to see what happens with kids today, and how are they treated - especially in the US. Nothing against US, but hey - 6 years old kid shooting other kids? Trench-coat mafia? Etc, etc, etc?
You maybe think that CyberPatrol will solve these problems too?
People are looking in wrong direction. Kids are not crazy because of computers - kids are crazy because of the world they are surrounded with...
Shame...
I know what I am about to say goes against the grain of /. thinking which is why this comment is being posted as an AC - the first time I have felt the need to do so. However let's face it, most of the people who read /. are still at school or college and don't have kids of their own - and as such their comments on this issue are uninformed and arrogant.
When, one day, who finally have children you will understand that censorware is not wrong, it is in fact the only solution that will allow you to bring up your children in a moral way without polluting them with the filth that makes up most of the Internet. Children are inherently vulnerable and early exposure to such disturbing material such as pornography, gay rights or sexually transmitted diseases can scar them for life, making it far harder for them to grow up to become fine upstanding people with a good Christian decency.
However I believe in the Internet and want my children to be able to access all of the wonderful educational information that it contains. Not letting my children do so would be holding their future development back, but letting them access the Internet unfettered by filtering software would be exposing them to every kind of human sin and degredation. This is why I support censorware whole-heartedly, and I expect those few parents here on /. to agree with me, even if they don't say so for fear of being labelled "fascists" or "nazis" by the younger members of /.s readership.
The Australian government is obviouly more concerned with the growth and morality of their nation's children than with such modern illusions as "free speech" and "equal rights". Such things only get in the way of the happiness of society in the long-term.
New XFMail home page
/bin/tcsh: Try it; you'll like it.
What these groups are doing is very similar to the fellow that cracked the ecommerce sites, obtained the lists of credit cards numbers, and posted samples of those on a web site. Sure, the fellow was trying to point out that security on the web is nearly non-existant at many places, but the means to demonstrate this is poor.
I think that if a group of hackers was interested in fighting for the cause, they would approach the commercial companies, and offer to aid in their services, either to ensure the security of the blocked site list, or to maybe aid in improving the criterion that the blockers use. Assuming that the creditals of such a group are good, along with the offer to sign NDAs, I don't see why a company would not want to accept this offer (OTP: while the movie sucked, the concept of the team in 'Sneakers' is exactly what I'm thinking of). The only huddle to this is to get companies to respect these various hacker groups; initially, only small projects would be worked on, but as the involvement of a hacker team outside of the company is used to achieve successful results, more and more companies will want to participate. Certainly most companies do have their own security team, but adding a third party will always improve the quality of the final product.
Of course, I also still believe that for censoring the web, self-regulation is the real only answer. The only problem is to get 1) a standard and 2) some body to maintain that standard and implement an informal protocol to handle it. Sure, RSCI is almost there, but it's not widely implemented. What such a team can do is to first get a small subset with a good cross-section of the web and set the various ratings on it, so that a baseline for what a "violence: 3 (out of 5)" represents, for example. This will help those that want to self-censor their page to understand what the levels are. In addition, there should be a way for the causal user to send feedback to the standards body, to let them know of a site that might not have the ratings on them, or the ratings are inappropriate, such that the standards body (as opposed to the user) can contact that page's owner and ask them to adjust the rating. There's nothing forced about it, and no legal penalty can be brough against the offending site, but I would figure that getting such emails repeatedly will eventually force them to update their page.
If such a system was in place, then it's rather easy for parents to set the censor levels to what they think is appropriate for Junior, with password protection to keep those settings out. Sure, the script kiddie will probably find a way to crack the password and get to the sites, but for the most part, this would achieve the censoring without forcing issues with commercial products.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
Is that really necessary? I mean, the whole point of this effort was not to produce a program that could decrypt CyberPatrol's list so that millions of script kiddies could mirror away and the software could be used forever, completely destroying the decryption. The goal was to expose the list and CyberPatrol's motivations. I mean, honestly, mirror the list. That's what's damaging. A couple of lawsuits brought against this company will be enough to bring it down. It doesn't matter if they re-encrypt their list. The fact that these web sites are in there should be enough to form a case, and the list has already been decrypted. This program is not the next DeCSS, the list is.
And, in this case, a good reason to take away the profit motive, which represents a conflict of interest for these sleazy companies.
--
An esoteric scratched itch:
Homeworld Map Maker Tool
Before we start, I want it noted for the record that I am in fact a Christian, as this poster claims to be. I belong to no formal demonimation therein at this point in time, but nonetheless we share many of the same beliefs. My post may sound uncharacteristically preachy, but I am attempting to argue on this poster's own terms. I've found that to be more effective than simply screaming aimlessly.
You are scum. You are lazy, overzealous, bookburning scum. I'd nearly go so far as to call you an unfit parent, but that may be going slightly too far. So instead I'll explain my statemeent point-by-point.
I said you were lazy. This is because you obviously don't take the time to do your job as a parent right (and you can always make time; sometimes it isn't easy, and sometimes it involves making sacrifices, but your job as a parent is the single most important job you have and to shirk that responsibility, as you advocate doing, is among the most immoral things I've ever seen). It's not enough to teach a child "don't do this." You have to teach them why not to do it. Censorware, your artificial babysitter, cannot do that. Schools cannot do that. Live babysitters can't do that either. Only you can. And yes, that may mean that you have to take time out from watching the game to be with your child. You might have to momentarily take a break from whatever hobbies you have. You may even have to expose them to certain kinds of "filth," as you call it, to get the point across. But if you must, far better to do it in a controlled situation than letting the kids stumble into it on their own (and they will, eventually; no filtering software blocks everything).
You are a bookburner because you advocate such. "The Australian government is more concerned with the growth and morality of their nation's children..." That's wrong, and worse, you know it's wrong. A good, moral child grows up knowing not only what is right and wrong, but why things are right or wrong, and you propose that we all leave our children and ourselves in the hands of poorly-coded software that cannot teach these things. Because you're apparently too lazy to so this, you would instead kill the growth of knowledge, the very thing which makes us what we are.
And then, we get to your lunatic zealotry. We could start by your statement that you would impose your beliefs on the whole world, which is immoral even if the beliefs do happen to be correct. You have no right to force anything on anyone, not even your own religion (and if you ever read the Bible that you're so proudly thumping in this post, you'll see that). God gave humanity free will so they could choose Him freely (or even not choose Him if they wished), but certainly not so false Christians could force their will upon people. I assert that free will is the single most precious of God's giftts to humanity, as it is the only gift given to humans alone, and thus the one which defines our humanity. So there is no greater sacrilege than to deny this gift, or to attempt to crush it, as you advocate. Chew on that for a while.
While we're at it, let's look at your definition of "filth." I see pornography there, and I agree with you on that count. I cannot agree on the sexually-transmitted disease bit; that knowledge is simply too useful, and could quite possibly save your child's life someday. Then, there's the "gay rights" one. How is that filth, I ask? I've never seen any examples of pornography, gay or otherwise, on any gay-rights site. Nor have I ever seen any hate speech (which is conspicuously absent from your definition of "filth," by the way). All I see is people fighting for their civil rights. What's so bad about that? And let's go back to the absence of hate speech from your lists for a moment. Surely you consider that to be filth; is God not supposed to be a diety who loves all His children? I can point out numerous instances where just that is said. And if you're going to pull out the tired old "God hates fags" bit, I think we could get into quite an interesting theological discussion on why I don't believe this is, strictly speaking, the case. That's an honest invitation, by the way.
You say "I expect those few parents here on Slashdot to agree with me, even if they don't say so for fear of being labeled 'fascists' or 'nazis' by the younger members of Slashdot's readership." Several points here:
Finally, you say "Such things [free speech and equal rights] only get in the way of the happiness of society in the long-term." No. They are what keeps a society happy. What if I told you that because I found your words offensive, you would be permanently silenced? Certainly you would take offense, and you would be right to. But that's no different from what you are doing; because you don't like something you don't think anyone should have the right to say it. That's arrogance on an unbelieveable scale, that you think that you somehow have the right to rule the minds of the whole world. Funny, I seem to remember someone else saying that a very long time ago. If I remember correctly, he was called Satan. I'll leave you to figure out where I'm going with that statement.
This software blocks access to sites that criticize it under fraudulent reasons. This is enough to validate a suite for slander.
The obvious defense of course will be that they didn't block it deliberately which is why it is necessary to sue simultaneously for consumer deception. Any Australian taxpayer can file such a suite.
These people are caught between a rock and a hard place if you want to squeeze them. All you have to do is bang them around in court since they have no legs to stand on and get a settlement that says "we will only market to home users and actively discourage legislation that forces us on libraries and ISPs."
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
Not exactly. The parents never get to see the list of the blocked sites so they cannot check that in fact they agree with publisher on the choice of sites, since the list is secret.
Also what about having the parents add or remove items from the list? Is it possible?
...richie - It is a good day to code.
They must be picking up their dysfunctionality from somwhere before they get exposed to these things. Where are they getting it from?
Mankind has always dreamed of destroying the sun.
Intelligent people know that when stable, well-adjusted individuals are exposed to pornography and violence, they aren't adversely impacted by it. So the question becomes: why aren't we raising stable, well-adjusted people? No one likes to answer that question, because it's a poor reflection on all these people pushing the censorware in the first place.
Mankind has always dreamed of destroying the sun.
Oohhh neato, look what they did. I don't see the point. Beyond publishing embarrasing lists of unjustly blocked websites that only netheads read. If the point is that you don't want public access facilities filtered through censorware, legislation is the only effective cure. Annoying these companies and giving them a little bad press won't hurt them at all. In fact by hacking/cracking this software they are pushing legislators into the opposite corner.
I mean, lets get real. Mr or Ms. average net user hears about things being cracked or hacked, viruses, DDOS attacks and other techno mumbo jumbo scaryisms all they want to do is complain to the government (thus more restrictive legislation) or buy the pigslop security or "protection" software to err on the better side of caution (what do you think convinces people to buy this junk? Real life experience or the scary stuff they hear from talking heads on the news.
Go ahead and keep up this wonderful line of attack. Give them seemingly good reason to write bs legislation and scare cluless consumers into buying more censorware. I just can't wait until they (MIB) implant that GPS transmitter and thought recorder in my head.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Ok ,maybe shelter isn't the correct word. At some level you have to show your kids right from wrong by example. Being overprotective can produce bitterness but it is also true that that bitterness, rebelling againt authority, is a pretty standard feature of the human condition.
If you say nothing is off-limits then you wind up with kids that don't respect authority and get in trouble a lot.
On the other hand if you maintain an authoritative stance and let them experiment with different things as they mature then they are more likely to respect authority. Giving reasons helps also. "Don't do drugs because drugs are for losers. Every person I grew up with who started doing drugs in HS is either dead or working the takeout at McDonalds." or "You are too young to watch porn on the net. maybe when you are a little older I'll help you understand that just because people do things to each other on film or in a picture it doesn't mean that someone your age blah blah blah"
The point is that there are two seperate issues. Getting your kids to respect authority when it deserves respect and showing them that you care enough to want them to gradually be eased into the realities of the world. When I see some punk kid 13YO walking the street with the attitude of an Ex-Con it makes me want to cry. The world is rapidly becoming a big information gererator and repository and kids can become shellshocked running face first into a battleline of uncensored information.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Personally, I could care less about some piece of babysitting software. About the only time I find the use of it offensive, is when it's enforced upon a non-minor by another entity (such as the fuster cluck down in Australia).
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Troll feeding time.
Yes, sorry, it does view it as damage. Can you name one thing that has been censored off the internet? Anything? Just one tiny item?
No, you can't, because any blocking of any infomation immediately causes that information to become accessable in about 10x that number of places.
-David T. C.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
I haven't finished reading it yet, but from the first few pages, it looks very interesting. I will finish this once I get home from work.
they go into how to reverse engineer, and use their project as an example. If you wanna learn about (un)secure system design, read this!
I post links to stuff here
Congratulations! You are now eligible to become the next Digital Millenium Copyright Act martyr! You have bypassed a device that protects access to a copyrighted work (the blocklists).
Ain't life grand?
The issue has NOTHING to do with parents protecting their children. It has to do with companies using their own product to keep people from seeing web sites that show the truth. It's about revealing that these companies lie about what their software does. You may not live in the US, but if you start to let companies tell you one thing, and do another, you might as well give up ever getting a decent product.
And as for Free Speech, I find your post SO very ironic. You treat it like dirt yet you take FULL advantage of it just to post to SlashDot here. Maybe next time you think about posting, you won't have `free speech' and I won't have to listen to your pathetic whining anymore.
Bad Mojo
Bad Mojo
"If you can't win by reason, go for volume." -- Calvin
You can take your hint and shove it up your ass, KID.
Maybe you think that trolling is freedom of speech. Maybe you think shouting fire in a theater or killing a cop is free speech. If so, you make an excellent point. But it's obvious that you confuse free speech with `doing what I want'. At SlashDot, the user can censor what he wants of the SPEECH here. If I want to read what others have to say, it's easy enough to view every single comment that wasn't some lame attempt at destroying the forum itself.
Until people start to realize that free speech takes work and effort, no one is going to get it. And here you are, taking it for granted. Saying you don't even have it. Wait till it's gone I say. Then enjoy what you get.
Bad Mojo
Bad Mojo
"If you can't win by reason, go for volume." -- Calvin
Hi Rudolfo,
ear wouldn't comment on the findings, but Bruce >Taylor, chief counsel to the National Law Center for Children and Families in Fairfax, Va., disputed Haselton's study. The National Law Center for Children and Families is certainly not a US Government agency
The NLC, while not being an actual govmnt agency, is actually even a little worse - they are an active lobbying house for legislative action. In other words, they are a force behind a lot of the truly shity legislation that gets passed concerning censorship - and they're damned proud of it.
I admit that my title is overkill - they are not a government agency, but for all intents and purposes, they are a component of the US legislative body.
If that makes no sense, read their web pages, or just go straight here.
thanks,
--
blue
i browse at -1 because they're funnier than you are.
Hi Zico,
... tree huggers and bra burners that came before you
...
Your immature response, by the way, is why politicians laugh at people like you and make comments like the one you quoted.
Since you didn't quote anything, and most of my post was pretty low-key, I can only assume that you're talking about the line about revolt. Since you were nice enough to call me skippy, allow me to give you a short education on some methods of literary humor:
The quote from the lawyer referred to a revolution, a cyberpunk one. My line also referred to a revolution, but in the proletariat sense. See? Get it?
Also, I believe I fully qualified my statement by saying that it was his attitude that bothered me - I am not a child, I am not out of control, and I do not have the conch. I do, however, feel very strongly that I should be in control of everything I do, and that is my god-given right to beat off to Pr0n any time I like. Do you like it when people make blanket statements about your lifestyle, your friends, your hobbies, in a derragatory manner? I certainly don't.
Yes, damn those tree-huggers and bra-burners. I mean, women don't need to vote, right? And, fuck those darn trees anyways, always getting in the way of the pavement...
If you think that freedom and equality are the punchline to a passe joke, well.. there's just not much I can say to you. I am very, very sorry. We live in different worlds, I guess.
talk to people instead of making utopian speeches at themm and maybe people would actually be open to debating the subject with you
nonsensical shit like, "The Internet views censorship as damage and routes around it."
Did you actually read my post? Were you actually responding to me? I mean, did you mean to put that in quotes, as though I said it? I post a lot, and I very, very rarely resort to cliche.
themselves into thinking that they're heroic in a world of absolutes
Nice sentance. I think the peacefire.org people and the guys who wrote the article ARE heros. So, you're absolutley right. I thank them sincerely and deeply for risking the ire of those who are into opressing such things.
it does bring up the delicious
possible irony of the anti-"censorware" crowd trying to label me a troll so that most people will ignore the points I'm making...
The point is that I'm just having fun,
You made it too easy - these lines are almost back to back. You're just having fun, possibly trying to get a rise out of people, possibly, hell, I dunno, trolling? Welp, I bit.
something that every child should be tought in school, as opposed to the self-important dreck that comes out of
the anti-"censorware" movement
Interesting point - sort of. If I ever have children, I will make damn sure that they understand the concept of censorship. I will make damned sure that they understand the concept of revolution, and that they understand their reponsibility to humanity to stand up for freedom and everyone's right to be left the fuck alone and live their life as they wish.
--
blue
i browse at -1 because they're funnier than you are.
Quote from news.com the other day: (Haselton is the peacefire guy)
---
Gear wouldn't comment on the findings, but Bruce Taylor, chief counsel to the National Law Center for Children and Families in Fairfax, Va.,
disputed Haselton's study.
"I don't trust that Peacefire is telling the truth," Taylor said. "It's all part of the cyberpunk revolution. They don't like the government telling them that they don't have free access to the Internet. It's like 'Lord of the Flies,' and they think they have the conch."
---
That condescending, patronizing bullshit opinion in and of itself is more than enough to put me in the mood to grab a pitchfork and prepare for the politicians-up-against-the-wall kind of revolution.
The issue is not with censoreware, folks, the problem is with the use of hidden and encrypted ban lists. If everyone could see and change those lists at will, then censoreware, while still standing zero chance of actually working, would at least be acceptable.
As for the issue of performance, I think it's a pretty simple math problem to determine the chances of any one product effectively filtering Pr0n on the great big lan - with the number of new sites coming up every day, the ability of Pr0n purveyors to change sites at will, etc, etc, the chance of a high success rate is pretty well near nil, even if you consider only the sites that play by the rules and allow themselves to be censored.
--
blue
i browse at -1 because they're funnier than you are.
Again, no. You can't determine what a parent does with their computer. As for computers in public facilities, you'd have to take it up with the owners of the computer, not the makers of the software.
Just as when someone gets shot, (generally... you never know anymore in this day and age) it's the shooter that gets in trouble, not the gun manufacturer. But in these days of "lets sue everybody" it sounds like gun makers are also starting to see some lawsuits as well.
If you find yourself in one of those lists, and believe that you're there for no good reason, take the time to write the company (on paper would be even better than just an email) and kindly explain to them why you don't feel that your site falls into the category which they placed you in.
But yeah, in the end, you don't have any real leg to stand on to go after the makers of censor ware... Your only hope would be to take it up with the publicly run places that install the software.
NO.
In the US at least, this software is used by parents on their home machines... Parents have every right in the world to say what and what not their children can do and see on the internet on their home machines. It'd be awefully difficult for parents to configure proxy servers on their own that explicity block sites that they stumble across, not to mention the waste of effort. By using the software, parents are implicitly agreeing that they agree with the censorware's author's idea of what and what is not acceptable.
It's not like it should make much difference to many sites... I mean, kids don't generally have credit cards, so they can't order anything... All those ads also basically go to waste because again kids can't order anything they see promoted on various sites.
So far as the blocking of Peacefires site goes, that's probably acceptable as well... Why should parents go through the hassle of buying and installing the software if the kids can easily go to a site that gives them tools to circumvent this.
You have to realize, kids are not real citizens. Parents are in most cases liable for the actions of their kids... They have every right in the world to determine what constitutes acceptable use and what does not. It's not a denial of service attack...
As does your response. Your immature response, by the way, is why politicians laugh at people like you and make comments like the one you quoted. See, you come off as having absolutely no sense of proportion, as being just another wacko zealot, like the tree huggers and bra burners that came before you. I.e., the punchline to a passé joke. Get a grip, climb down from your high horse, learn the meaning of the first amendment, talk to people instead of making utopian speeches at themm and maybe people would actually be open to debating the subject with you. As it stands, you come off like a bunch of kiddies wanting to do a lot of grandstanding to give yourself a false sense of relevance.
And for the love of God, quit saying stupid nonsensical shit like, "The Internet views censorship as damage and routes around it." No, Skippy, it doesn't, not anymore than a Tooth Fairy actually brought you cash for your lost baby molars.
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
That is, about people making such a big deal about free speech that the debate becomes ludicrous. Do you really think you come off as a rational person when you attack res0? He surely didn't say anything worth throwing your average person into a hissy fit.
And as for Free Speech, I find your post even more ironic. Here's a hint, kid: There isn't free speech at Slashdot. Post too many trolls (read: posts that argue that Linux isn't perfect, or that don't meet the proper lame anti-Microsoft joke quota) in one day, and Slashdot might take away the ability to post from that user's IP address for a while. Same goes for the newly instituted "70 second between posts" rule, which screws the prolific and the speed typers out there. In other words, there is no free speech at Slashdot -- perhaps you could take up the crusade to boycott Slashdot?
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
If the system is still implemented as it was before, then a certain number of posts that get moderated "Troll" coming from a specific IP address, within a certain time period, would trigger, for a certain time period (a day, I think), posts coming from that same IP to be blocked.
There is also a mechanism which keeps the same person from posting more than once within a certain time period, perhaps 70 seconds.
From both of these things, you cannot say that Slashdot has truly free speech. I'm not even arguing that Slashdot is doing a bad thing, but if you're going to, on principle, excoriate someone who thinks that some limitations on free speech aren't so bad, but excuse Slashdot for its own limitations on free speech, then your position isn't based upon principle after all. Instead, it's a subjective position, which doesn't really give you much moral high ground in this argument, because you're basically saying that, "Well, I just like my limitations better than yours."
Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com
Any type of CensorWare (CW) that uses any form of encryption on its blacklist is fated to be broken. The whole concept of the Open Source Movement supports this: 1000+ eyes peering deep into the quality and structure of your software.
Those 1000+ eyes all have computers, and quite a few will have mathematical and progamming skills capable to dissecting the encryption used by the CW blacklists. All it takes is a little time, and the encryption will be broken.
Strangely enough, the US Govt's ban on exporting high-level encryption actually assists in this -- someone outside Canada or the US with a good machine can crack the export version of these CW blacklists in a short span of time.
Perhaps 5 years ago, this would not have been the case, but now we have personal computers that have massive calculative capabilities (equal to a Cray of 20 years ago??), and the ability to distribute the calculation/cracking process over multiple machines running 24/7. The encryption will fail.
So, will there ever be a time when CW blacklists are encrypted in such a manner that completely defeats the resourceful hacker? Not bloody likely.
Keep up the good work, guys. Every one of your successes shows the true meaning of Freedom of Speech.
"The dead do not shoo-bop-aloo-bah." -- Kai, 'Lexx'
I suggest that, in the future, you refrain from posting unless you have something substantive to say.
wants to be the first monkey to touch the monolith
I must say I don't get this point. After all, porn only (usually) shows people having sex (even if it sometimes look very dirty *grin*). What's the problem with this ? I mean, is it worse than showing people killing other people for the Nation, or for God, or (name a so-called "noble" cause here) ? Aren't these materials available to children ? Yes, often they are, and rightfully so.
I think there are more important things to do than deny to our children the access to resources considered harmful in our current society.
What the US Govmnt thinks about anti-censorware:
... "I don't trust that Peacefire is telling the truth," Taylor said.
Bruce Taylor, chief counsel to the National Law Center for Children and Families in Fairfax, Va., disputed Haselton's study.
The National Law Center for Children and Families doesn't appear to be an arm of the U.S. Government. According to their Fil tering Memorandum of Law, they are a "non-profit educational organization."
It is true that two of their three senior counsel used to work in the Justice Department, and it is probable that Taylor's public opinion reflects the private opinion of other members of Justice. But it's inappropriate to regard this outburst as an official statement of policy of the U.S. Government.
I almost can't believe you honestly believe this. The notion that access to pornography has any correlation whatsoever with criminal activity is just so totally unsupported, to the best of my knowledge. If you disagree, educate me. Please.
--
Do I look like I speak for my employer?
Shown by whom, may I ask, and why would I consider them (whoever they may be) any more credible than the ADL themselves?
--
Do I look like I speak for my employer?
I'm no fan of the US puritan society, and think that most censorship goes way too far. However not all web pages are "a couple of naked bodies having sex". These days on the Internet you can find s&m, necrophelia, pedophelia, beastiality, rape, etc. "Playboy" might not scar a kid for life, but there are sites out there that I would guess aren't healthy for young minds.
Yeah, it took me over an hour to read it, I didn't understand half of it, but it was very interesting. I just wonder how long it'll be before they get complaints for putting the dissassembled code on the page (all of 10lines).
What is ludicrous in nature is lengths these politicians will go to in blaming the worlds problems on pornography and "subversive" influences on the internet. It is all about getting themselves in the media and creating fear and misunderstanding to further their agendas. Protecting children is only a convenient excuse.
Why do you think so many of these products block political sites and sites critical of censorship?
I agree totally. Software can never replace parental involvement. That being said, might it still be possible to create software (in an open manner) that assists parents in monitoring their child's net usage? It would use public ban lists that the users themselves would maintain. Feedback from the users would constantly refine the publicly readable ban lists, and users could opt into lists that seem to most closely match their needs. They can always selectively permit or deny specific sites... and those choices could even help strengthen or weaken the weights assigned to sites in the ban lists.
OK, a crazy idea... but worth discussing.
Thad
The Bolachek Journals
Actually, its painfully apparent that that isnt correct. What the parents are actually implicitly agreeing to is that they agree with some form of automated scripts idea of what is and is not acceptable.
The question is, would the parents agree if they knew what their children could or could not watch was entirely up to a computer, and very few, if any, sites were actually inspected manually?
Disturbing indeed. I've seen pretty much the same stuff on the evening news tho. Those war victims and accident/starvation/disease images never look nice.
The problem, of course, is that censorware wont block it. What you end up with is an arbitrary list of sites to be blocked for some arbitrary reason decided without human intervention a few months to years after something is on the net.
Face it, the world isnt a happy happy joy joy place, in fact, it pretty much stinks.
Sometimes I wonder how much of adolescents problems are due to the fact that their parents cant lie and decieve them anymore, and they're left without sufficient psychological defences when they are confronted with the actual reality of life. I dont know, but experience tells me you deal with problems much better when you are informed, so Ive never quite understood the 'keep em ignorant until they see through it and never trust us again' approach.
But they wont be able to stop it. These kinds of pictures are _pervasive_ in society, it isnt just on the web you'll find them.
Even worse, what if there is chance they will end up in a picture like that? Or end up causing a picture like that? Which is the best plan, teach them that bad things happen in the world and how to avoid it or fight against it, or keep them ignorant until they're faced with it?
For violent teenagers, after getting caught in violent crime, actually _showing_ them the real damage their kicks and battery causes, the faces of their battered and bruised victims, educating them on what violence really looks like, has been shown to decrease repeat crime. Looking at the average 'censored' action flick you'd think you can beat someone up pretty bad without consequences. Faced with the brutal reality they are less likely to do it.
I remember in psych class, we were shown a few studies where _cartoons_ showed up to be the most likely to cause violence in small children. Why? Because the 'morals' of a cartoon says you can smash someone with a door and they'll just get flat for a while.
Censoring sometimes does more harm than good. Less reality in a tv fight truly causes less of trauma, but it also teaches the wrong interpretation of the consequences of violence. The natural reaction _is_ natural and it teaches something.
I agree, nobody, wether kids or adults should ever have to see such things, on images or in real life. But the energy should be spent fighting the causes, rather than pretending it isnt there.
What an incredible read! These guys really have their act together, and this is a MUST read for anyone interested in reverse engineering anything with crypytography.
What I really got out of this article (Other than the obvious facts about censorware) is that security through obscurity is never a good thing. In this case, it just took some bright programming and some time with a decompiler.
What was even more entertaining is how limiting their key space for the hash algorithm actually improved the security (marginally) such that a dictionary attack was a bit harder. While not that much harder, the authors have an excellent point that security would be better with salts.
Kudos to these guys for a fascinating read and a good job engineering.
Think about this realisticly here...
If you're not specifically looking for it, its very hard to come across, especially for kids under 10, who will no doubt be looking for pokemon sites and whatever. Kids 10-16, if they do go looking for it, what do you think their reaction will be? "Ewww Sick" or they laugh it off.
This kind of content doesn't have as much effect on children as some people would have you belive.
-- iCEBaLM
I think most people agree that, in certain ways, "censorware" can be useful. No one really wants kids to easily see hard core porn, do they?
To be perfectly honest with you, if I had children, I wouldn't care one way or the other if they see hard core porn.
Why you ask?
Because all kids do it, I know when I was 10 or 11 I found my brothers porn mags and looked through them, curiously. It didn't scar me for life, it didn't make me go into violent convultions, it didn't kill me.
For gods sake here, all it is is a couple of naked bodies having sex, who cares! Kids can undress and look at themselves too ya know. These puritan mores in our society sicken me.
When it's all said and done, it's not about sheilding your children from nudity and sex, because they are going to see it eventually whether you like it or not. It's about bringing up well adjusted children who are able to handle it.
-- iCEBaLM
Yes the world is a bad place, but third graders shouldn't have to scared that they will end up in one of those pictures.
Maybe if third graders worldwide were exposed to these kinds of pictures, we could end war/torture within a generation...
--
A man who wants nothing is invincible
How? Third graders don't start wars.
And they are not inherently racist. Most negative human behaviors are learned, so why not teach positive ones instead, i.e., if they realize how bad war is they will never want to have one.
As it is things like nationalism are taught, so while it is true that "thou shalt not kill" ideas like "better dead than red" take precedence...
Or do you think the leaders of countries have never seen people maimed and killed?
The problem is that world leaders not only have seen death and destruction, they often encourage it to maintain their grip on power. The sad part is that most people accept such behavior from world leaders.
For an example, witness the apathy in the U.S. regarding the overthrow of popularly elected socialist Salvador Allende (democracy) by Pinochet and the Chilean military (military dictatorship). It is a known fact the CIA was aware of the Chilean death squads that killed not only Chileans but also citizens from other countries.
Again, if we taught our third graders about peace and love instead of war and hate, we probably could eliminate war (unless of course you believe that man's animal side means that man will always go to war or murder because of our nature).
Sorry, I woke up feeling exceptionally CYNICAL today!!!
--
A man who wants nothing is invincible
That isn't the important point though.
These pieces of software are sold to parents on the basis of several claims.
The main claim being that they allow parents to block sites.
The issues are:
1) Do they actually do what they claim - do they succesfully block the sites the parents want blocked ?
2) Do they do anything else - possibly as a side-effect of (1) ? (and possibly for other reasons).
3) Are parents told the honest truth about what the product does and how well it performs ?
It is IMPORTANT for responsible parents to know the limitations of the software they have chosen.
IMV Every sensible parent should be concerned as to what their children are doing on the internet. That concern will vary according to the age of the child.
What concerns many people is that all the various suppliers go out of their way to make verifying the performance of their products dificult - both through technological and legal means.
However if the claims of the people attacking the censorware products are correct then all the products are offering is a false sense of security. This should concern anyone.
Likewise it should concern any parent that the product they have bought to protect their child is allowing an external third party to manipulate the information presented to their children, possibly with dubious political or other motives - this manipulation being concealed from the parent.
When these same products are used in places like libraries ( and some people are trying to achieve exactly that) then the potential dangers should be apparent to everyone.
I believe that the companies marketing censorware claim they have to protect their blocked sites list etc because that is where most of their "creative" work is done. However this means that it is impossible for most people to check performance. When experts have analysed the software in depth, then in every case so far they have found that the performace is pretty poor and disturbing in many ways.
The awful truth may be that there is no simple, lazy method for parents to use software to control what their kids are doing on the internet.
If that is true (and I believe it is likely) then that means that responsible parents are going to have to look to other methods. Options like secure logging of where their kids have been surfing, supervision of children. Amongst other things this puts power back where it belongs - in the hands of parents so they can make their own decisions, rather than in the hands of some unknown company or pressure group who may well be simply lying because they believe that "they know better" and "the ends justify the means".
Likewise I can see there may be potential problems with internet access in libraries. However all such potential problems have solutions which are a lot more subtle, refined (and genuinely effective) than crude software which dare not even reveal its limitations to view.
I can see why busy parents look for shortcuts. However products which don't do what they claim and do do things which are kept concealed are not a solution. I'd rather parents faced up to the problem.
AJB
I know I never post here, but I thought what the hell
Regarding kids accessing porn:
Who really caress that a teenager can see porn. If a parent is actually concerned enough to buy the software, they are wither overreacting, or their kids are looking at it.
Besides, whats really wrong with porn...
Some say that it hurts children in the long run, but it does not. All you are seeing is 2 (or more) naked people having sex. Whats wrong with that. Its the kids choice to see the porn (most of the time). They can certainly find ways around the software.
All the pictures were from www.rotten.com and should be blocked by any filter. The img tags on my page link to the pictures on rotten's servers.
Ryan
How? Third graders don't start wars. Or do you think the leaders of countries have never seen people maimed and killed?
Ryan
I getting real tired of hearing people say "it's just naked people fucking, why should we need to filter that?" And "let kids see sex, it's not unhealthy." I spent about ten miutes gathering a few pictures that you might not want your kids to see. Disturbing pictures that might very well cause emotional trauma. If I could find these pictures in ten minutes, you can imagine that much, much worse things exist on the net.
Note: these are very disturbing pictures, you DON'T want to see them. Do yourself a favor and skip the link.
http://www.ryans.dhs.org/sick.html
Ryan
Wouldn't the list fall under copyright protection though?
Sponge
The solution is to stop thinking in terms of keywords/phrases and manually-compiled lists of sites. These are methods that have been shown to consistently loose.
My mother is a primary (elementary) school teacher, and the use of CyberPatrol is mandated by the Education Department. It blocks searches for the phrase black cockatoo (a common Australian bird) because it contains the substring black cock. This kind of mistake is unvavodable in a pattern-matching system.
Decryption of block-lists by Peacfire and friends have shown us quite clearly that these lists are compiled in a manner that is not just sloppy, but actively malicious.
The solution is to implement a scheme of probability of content type in exactly the same way that Google does it. If lots of known porn sites, or sites with a high occurrence of "bad" words link to a given page, then that page is very probably filled with porn.
Another technique is to look at combinations of factors. If a page scores highly in "sex" category, but also in "psychology" then it is probably safe to assume that it is a research paper on human sexuality and not porn. Similarly, if a page contains the words nude and supermodel but has no images or hyperlinks, then it is probably innocuous.
If anyone from Google is listening, how much to license your technology and database?
Be careful. People in masks cannot be trusted.
I had to support this software about 3 years ago. I believe there was a backdoor password that's the current date(its been a while). Also, you can just Ctrl-Alt-Delete your way out.
Of course, the bizarre thing about these programs is that they are a product which you sell to people which are designed to cripple their computers. If the software were efficient and trustworthy, of course, we could probably find it acceptable for use by home users who feel a need to install it on their (or their kids) PCs. (I'm not even going to get into the problems of public institutions inflicting these things on people, that's another debate.) However, what we have are a lot of people in the business of giving people a false sense of security.
I can some it up by paraphrasing (I don't remember the exact quote) an exchange between Homer Simpson and a con man:
Con Man:Now I could sell you a fancy security system with a lot of bells and whistles that doesn't really work.
Homer:Yeah, let's get that one!
The point is, how do these people get away with selling people software that doesn't actually work? I mean I could probably come up with a simple software program that would block exactly 50% of the World Wide Web (without checking content at all, just randomly blocking every other page) and say, "My product blocks more porn, violence and Satanic sites than any of my competitors." I could even (if I were able to hide my identity as a Libertarian rabble rouser) possibly get defenders from these AFA type associations provided my rhetoric was correct. The worst thing though is the lucerative government contracts some of these companies are starting to get. Believe it or not, these companies are probably only getting into this for the money, but once the money starts coming in they will be willing to spend at least some of it to continue pushing these bad laws. The Cyber patrol press release about Australia is particularly troubling in that regard. I don't like it when people commit to censorship for ideological reasons, but I think that when you add people with $ signs in their pupils but who don't have any particular ideological commitment to censorship, you create a really bad situation.
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
Perhaps someone could start a project to produce a GOOD "censorware" product, one that's engineered to block the right kind of sites.
First, there is very good censorware for libraries. It's called putting the computers in the middle of the room where anyone might happen to look over you sholder, complain to the librarian, and have you kicked out. If your library has a big problem with porn (i.e. many complains daily) then just run a slide show on the circulation desk computers that runs through the newer files in the netscape cache directories of the web browsers. These ideas will be FAR more effective then a software only solution.
Actually, the AVS probable to a better job of preventing kids from seeing porn then censorware dose, so if you really want to keep kids out of porn, just run an AVS which pays the sites more.
Second, the religious right dose not really care about blocking porn. They want to block information on gay rights, women's issues, etc. Porn is just a way to get people to lissen. This means that releasing an open source blocking program would only help them, i.e. they would proide a free program too, and we would still need to fight the legislation they push.
The short version of the above statment is "we can not prevent the crazies from controlling the censorware, so it is better not to have censorware."
Third, you over estimate the danger of internet content to kids. This is one of those "takl to your kids and the problem will go away things."
Clearly, the only solution we have is to kill all attempts to install censorware in public places.. and just let parents make up their own minds about censorware.
Now, if we want to do somethings to really help we should start suing the censorware companies for false blocks and implementing these ideas.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
This is borrowed from the linked report:
There are a few entries in the CyberNOT list that are blocked under all non-reserved categories. For instance, the anti-censorware site of Peacefire is listed as containing "Violence / Profanity, Partial Nudity, Full Nudity, Sexual Acts / Text, Gross Depictions / Text, Intolerance, Satanic or Cult, Drugs / Drug Culture, Militant / Extremist, Sex Education, Questionable / Illegal & Gambling, Alcohol & Tobacco". That's not such a surprise; blocking Peacefire has become traditional among censorware manufacturers.
In plain english: even when using CyberPatrol to block only sexually explicit and violent sites, allowing all others, you will still not be allowed to load the Peacefire site.
This seems like the most egregious violation of consumer trust a censorware distributor can commit; and until Peacefire decrpyted their lists, nobody would have been the wiser.
I don't need large brains to have a good time.
Since I'm on my PC at work, I can't find out much about it, and I won't go into the remaining issues, such as "who are those teachers?"
First, there is very good censorware for libraries. It's called putting the computers in the middle of the room where anyone might happen to look over you sholder, complain to the librarian, and have you kicked out. If your library has a big problem with porn (i.e. many complains daily) then just run a slide show on the circulation desk computers that runs through the newer files in the netscape cache directories of the web browsers. These ideas will be FAR more effective then a software only solution.
I disagree with this because I have worked in several university computer labs (that were next door to a High School) and being in a very public place never detured anyone from trying to view porn. I also run several sites in malls and we were required by the management to install filtering software and there are lots of attempts every day.
My view is that kids grow up to be intelligent. When they find out what's been hidden from them and why, all it does is create angry and bitter feelings, especially when other kids weren't so sheltered. Some of us willfully go off the wagon and become total party alcoholics. Like I'm making up for what I missed, or maybe I'm just spiteful. Censorship is bad. Posting anonymously.
> It's a naked couple engaged in sexual activity. Of course it's pornographic!
The deep problem is, as you know, that decent persons who share your wholesome heartfelt thorough revulsion to the horrible act of fornication, for technical reasons I'm sure we'd rather not elaborate in detail out here in public, end up childless. Whereas conversely, moral-less sensualists, career fornicators, by a perversity of the Universe, often end up parents even without intending to in the first place.
That such is the case in our contigent and accidental world is dreadful enough; the further fact that it is a veritable law of nature that such a state of affairs must necessarily be, is sad and awful proof that the Manichaeans were right, and that ours is indeed the worst of all possible worlds.
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
No one really wants kids to easily see hard core porn, do they?
What exactly is so wrong with "hardcore porn"? It's just two people having sex. Is it the nudity? The strong "sexual content"? Why do children have to be raised in an environment that teaches that what people do normally is bad? Is a penis (philisophically sorta) that much different of a body part than someone's arm? Why censor it? People always talk about this fucking "internet revolution", but all it is is the same bullshit, presented in a new form of technology. It would be funny to have the people that cry for more censorship suddently start kicking and screaming when they lose some of their privacy. Or maybe I just woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.
I am not that good a "cracker" myself, but I would be interested in having a look at what names are blocked from the list. Does anyone have the decrypted list available to download?
Thanks in advance
"Seeing basic rights disposed of in such a cavalier manner for the sake of convenience"
And is this sort of treatment the thing you want to display to your kids where the right to free speech is concerned. "Yeah, kid its important, thats why its in the Constitution - now shut up and stop trying to tell me its important you read about censorship on the peacefire.org website. I am your Parent, I tell you what you can say or do, remember that"
I don't think so...
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
The same way a tank on the street blocks traffic (including the "I screech at the phone line, you weenie" trolls) so does heavy trolling.
Blocking SPAM is not censorship. Blocking trolls is blockiong SPAM.
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
No. The list is full of adresses to websites. That information is owned by the sites respectively and not by the publishers of Cyber Patrol. They have compiled that list, but they do not own its contents. Either way, the customer has bought a licence to that information and may do with it almost as he wishes, as long as he can get to it, which he now can.
/ Per
I think we are missing the point here. With all the attempts at decrypting the ban list and publishing the plain text, one point they are trying to prove is that these censorware products simply SUCK. They are way too many porn sites popping up per the hour compared to a new ban list coming up. They are blocking site on reasons of not pornography, violence, but simply because the company does not like these sites, like PEacefire.
I gather these products have to be politically correct, so blocking out many activitist, racist, political-bashing etc sites is part of their job. But are we willing to bring up our child in a perfect haven? The moment he steps into society he is gonna get the f_ing culture shock of his life. I do not agree with showing a porn magazine a day to your children, but we cannot keep them pure forever. We want to have creative, thinking people who are willing to do the unthinkable and stand up for themselves in society. People who spent half their live watching only barney and friends ain't gonna make the mark.
Which brings the point, what in the f_ing world are parents here for? You think god or any almighty being created the basic family unit for fun? The purpose of the parents or being parents is to guide our children. Expose them to the appropriate, and shelter them accordingly to situation, time and age. How to you think human rights activitist themselves became one? If they had spent their life blind from abuse of human rights out there on the streets, they won't have give a damn now. Parental guidance and censorship are dynamic, stupid censorware products aren't.
Stop blaming the damn product for not doing its job when you ain't doing yours as a parent.
Gear wouldn't comment on the findings, but Bruce >Taylor, chief counsel to the National Law Center for Children and Families in Fairfax, Va., disputed Haselton's study. The National Law Center for Children and Families is certainly not a US Government agency
Aparrently this site was banned http://www.cet.com/~bangs/page2.htm (Well, a page that redirects to it was) - This is just about sheet music
Obviously that was because of the piece "Air on a G-String". Good lord, I hope my children never listen to such filth.
I'd be impressed if they were able to add microsoft.com and associated domains into the block sites list and stop my kids from seeing that, without the knowledge of the people at cyberpatrol...
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Esobofh - Currently drinking fresh mango juice.
If the site is blocked, say for nudity, when there is none, there probably would not be a case for libel. For libel to apply, you have to show ridicule or hatred. You also have to show that the information was published with either negigence, recklessness, or malice. Negligence is not needed in the case of a public figure or an issue of public interest.
There may have a case for intentional interference. Also, there may be a case of unfair and deceptive business practices.
Fight Spammers!
To my mind, putting Net Nanny on a kid's computer says "I don't trust you." more than it says "I want to protect you." However, I accept that reasonable people can disagree.
Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years
Parents have every right in the world to say what and what not their children can do and see on the internet on their home machines. I agree fully. The way I keep my children off the internet is easy. I tell them it is a magical thing, only for adults. As far as adult sites are concerned that answer is simple. I merely tell my youngens that those sites contain magical forbidden fruits that will make them wiser. Once again, it is only for adults.
Everytime you look at porn a devil gets their horns.
You have to realize, kids are not real citizens. I know. That is why I beat my kids on a regular basis. Since they aren't citizens they have very few rights. By beating them severly I make sure they stay on task plowing my land as I see fit. After all, they aren't real citizens.
Everytime you look at porn a devil gets their horns.
So with the ability to extract "proof" from one of these censorware packages that they're blocking a site, and misrepresenting why they're blocking it (the site mentions that Peacefire is blocked for Violence/Profanity, among other things), is there any type of legal action that can be taken against the creators of the censorware? It's just another form of a denial-of-service attack, isn't it?
NO CARRIER
Well, I guess I was incorrect in saying that phrase. It would've been better said as "Many parents do not want their children having access to hard core porn". I myself consider people having sex together fine, and I have no problem with nudity. But, there are things on the internet that go beyond just people having sex. I believe there are some images out there that really shouldn't be viewed by anyone. How about "pretend" rape pictures? How about child porn? This sort of content I believe, shouldn't be availiable to children, or anyone. I guess many of you don't share my views, I'm sorry for the assumption I made.
I think most people agree that, in certain ways, "censorware" can be useful. No one really wants kids to easily see hard core porn, do they? But, the way that the companies who produce this type of product are lazily progamming, it's blocking the wrong type of sites. There's a solution, if we all don't like what this is doing to youths trying to access the internet, then let's make an alternative. Perhaps someone could start a project to produce a GOOD "censorware" product, one that's engineered to block the right kind of sites. I'm sure it's possible, and if the program was made availiable freely that would be a great added bonus. "Why buy these expensive, commercial nanny products that block the wrong kinds of sites, when you can get our program which does it correctly for free?". Perhaps I'm just wishfully thinking here, but until an alternative is presented, people are going to side with the "censorware" companies.
More censorware cracked.
Wouldn't life be easier
With nothing like this?