Slashdot Mirror
UK Mobile Providers Introduce WAP Censorship
godsmoke writes "UK mobile providers have formed an alliance to block 'inappropriate content' from cell phone users under the age of 18. 'It covers images, video, gambling, games, chatrooms and net access but not premium rate voice and SMS services', says a BBC News article. The Code authorizing the changes is called the 'Code of Practice', and: 'Content with an 18 certificate will only be available when the network operators verify the age of the user'."
"The new code is going to make many people ask why, if the mobile people can do it, the fixed internet people can't." - John Carr
Here we go again...
Cell phones are not the same thing as the Internet. The Internet was design such that if a node goes down, traffic will route around it. A similar thing would happen if censorship were to be pressed upon us at the ISP level (analogous to the cell phone service providers) as users would simply find ways around it with tunneling protocols, mirrors, and the like.
And I have a feeling that this "new code" will be exploited as well. Of course it's a good thing that the phone companies want to protect children, but there are many ways that censorship like this can aid them in having a monopoly over other providers of mobile phone chat services. We'll just have to see what happens.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
... don't use it. Vote with your feet, buy your phone service elsewhere.
I see no reason why when somebody purchases the phone, the account can't have a birthdate associated with it... if I wish.
Then my daughter's phone only allows age-appropriate material.
I like it. If I could set it to keep all the older guys from calling her, I would pay triple what I pay now.
Ac
How are they going to know if someone is 18 or not?
On the web, all you have to do is click "Yes" or
"I agree" and your in, it's not exactly "secure".
I can just see "Press 1 if your over 18, now".
What if I as the parent of a 17 year old, give them permission to look at porn? Can I have that block removed from their phone... a phone I most likely bought and paid for in the first place?
--
In London? Need a Physics Tutor?
American Weblog in London
No under 18 year old would ever bother jerking off to low quality cell phone porn, so I don't see why that particular industry should be regulated on a cellular network.
If the dollar is an "I owe you nothing", then the Euro is a "Who owes you nothing." - Doug Casey
If it's left up to the phone companies, I suspect they'll be as good at it as most bars. Either that, or there will be a way around it by showing that you are eligible for a credit card, which the companies will then add a hefty charge to.
libertarianswag.com
Then I guess her Dad, Grandpa and Uncles can never call her to find out where she is or where she is going? What if it ends up blocked, like how my girlfriends emails to me always somehow end up in my spam folder...
1888 Franklin St.
Under 18... UK mobile providers have formed an alliance to block 'inappropriate content' from cell phone users under the age of 18.
So they can buy and smoke cigarettes, have sex, drink alchohol in a bar (with a meal) and join the army (die for their country), but they can't use mobile phones.
I'd prefer the sort of solution where under 16s (children) were not allowed internet phones period. What reason can they have to use phones for other than calling people and SMS (text, not pic)? Guess when I was 16 (1995) it was a different age...
But the phone companies insist on money-grubbing all the services they like while putting a net, with massive holes in it, under the users to absolve themselves of legal responsibility.
--
It is not the commies, the government, the nigger, nor the corporates. It is your paranoia.
They are implementing something on their own before a regulatory body tells them to implement it. Kudos to them. Basically they are implementing on cellphones exactly what a vast number of the public have been calling for in the internet, namely making the place safe for kids, and since pretty much every kid over here in the UK has a cellphone, I think this is going to be seen as a positive step forward. Yes, by all means shout the generic shout "but the parents should supervise the kids", but seriously, wap enabled cellphones are an epidemic with the under 18 population over here, and its trivial for someone to purchase one without a parents knowledge, so its a lot easier to supervise a kid on a PC than it is on one of these.
where there is a will there is a way and porn companies know this, ever been to those kids "hacker" sites ? what adverts do you see on them ?
and you think the cellphone market will be different ?
fact is the phone companies are running scared and resorting to porn to make cash as VOIP and WiFi becomes more prevalent, cutting them (the middlemen) out of the loop
i was at a large PC retailer the other day and the onlyt network products they sold was wireless, shelves and shelvbes of wifi routers,laptop cards and pc accesss points
goodbye ripoff cell firms cant say it was nice knowing you
For the benifit of people outside the UK ill tell you what this is, this is some total bullshit FUD bandwaggon that everyone and their dog is jumping on. Last week it was all over the front pages that the internet was to blaim for pedophiles and that in 1988 35 pedophiles were arrested but last year it was 600 (figures from my memory, might be wrong). Ofcourse this means that the internet has some magic way of taking normal people and somehow turning them into pedophiles! the result - total witch hunt and FUD. Then there was "more concern" because of mobiles and "3G technology" making the internet more mobile so now parents wouldnt be able to know what their kids were looking at! So now its all about saving the childeren. Of course no-one in their right mind would think that supervising young kids when they're online and explaining to them the dangers and the obvious common sense things would be a solution. This is a pretty minor thing, no-one uses wap anyway and its not total censorship just proof of age but the principle is there for some major censorship.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Modern color phones have good displays. Remember, porn happens in the mind, not on the screen. If they want to provide good porn, howevery, they will need a good content transformation system which can detect devices and transform and serve content appropriate for the device. Otherwise, if they have to use the least common denominator approach, you are right, all the images will be lame WBMPs.
In the age of Internet, one thing we have definitely learned is that anything will be circumvented. I am thinking that this will be no different.
Teaching (instead of just telling) people how to supervise their kids might be a good idea too.
Free XBox, PS2
I say "Three Cheers" to free speech, Slashdot, OSDN, and even competition sites to Slashdot such as ******.com or ***********.com
Thanks again for keeping it real, Slashdot!
I always found it funny that, in the UK, you can get married and have sex at the age of 16; yet you can't look at porno until you are 18. So it's possible to indulge in the most depraved sexual acts imaginable, but you're not allowed to view depictions of the same acts. Crazy!
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
There always will be a way to avoid censorship and control. I think it is best for parents to educate their children to have a critical sense to judge what they see/hear, and to choose not expose thenselves to material they do not have maturity to judge, than expecting others to decide what your children should ou should not see.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if users tried to view some artwork from, say, the Louvre (or most other art galleries), such as:
:-) For those who wish to play it safe, here's the caption, so you don't miss everything:
Venus
Hermaphrodite
Diana the huntress
The Turkish Bath
I'm not sure whether to include a "Not safe for work" declaration or not, especially for the last one
"Completed when he was 82, this composition was the result of many studies which Ingres made from 1807 onwards of female bathers, a theme linking the female nude with Turkish exoticism. His illustrations of the harem might well have been inspired by the "Letters of Lady Montagu" (1764) which he read forty years earlier. The serpentile contours of the bodies and his repeated use of the same model add a note of abstraction to the sensuality of this accumulation of voluptuous flesh, a pure fantasy of an exotic, perfumed Orient which had entranced Europeans for over a century."
I can see text filters tripping on some of the descriptive terms too.
All say 'aye' those who would gladly welcome providers blocking annoying ring tones and overly loud 'SMS received' beeps ! Never mind innapropriate content, these social nuisances are enough to make you kiiiilllll !
"I am not bound to please thee with my answers" [William Shakespeare]
Hardly anyone uses WAP anyway.
siggy played guitar
Like all horror stories related to children, the actual number of reported cases is small. However, it does actually occur from time to time according to news reports of specific incidents.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
I mean, it's just "another" logical step on the road that the UK has been rushing down--a "liberal" (in the classical sense of the word) surveillance state. And as a Yank, I'm not crowing--our current regime is doing its best to catch up to you guys. Each step is "logical" and defensible on its own--and it always leads to the next step, which is equally "logical" and defensible. And the grounds of the logic and defensibility are almost always the same: protect the children, defeat the terrorists, stop drug abuse, etc. In reality, the latter rationales are just specific example cases of the first--if "it" will protect the children from evildoers, "it" is good, end of inquiry. Bemoaning other consequences (such as the death of privacy, etc) is defeatism, unpatriotic, etc., etc.--and highly suspect.
/.ers, but it seems inevitable given the general sheepish nature of the populace at large.
This is the fate of the individual in the "advanced" countries in the 21st century: to dwell in a transparently "open" society, where as little as possible is hidden from the government. I don't like it any more than most
It's not FUD at all.
Porn distributors exploit their customers in much the same way as drugs pushers, as well as exploiting the raw material. (No-one cares what happens to the opium poppy either as long as it makes heroin that sells well.)
I'm glad to see mobile phone companies taking such simple action to protect children from harm that other customers will inevitably use the network to distribute.
It WOULD NOT be practical to keep children from the streets because drugs pushers use the streets to, IT IS practical to take this step thanks to some of the features of modern digital processing.
So where's the FUD?
Its better than the mobile networks themselves teaming up to distribute the porn, I don't know how many are still planning to do this, but here's some news:
Playboy have teamed up with Virgin Mobile to plan a pornographic site for the 3G system in Europe. (and others, read the link)
Maybe they sawthe light
Or maybe just thinking again
blog.sam.liddicott.com
ok maybe its a good idea in this case, but no-less it was totally fueled by last weeks headlines and its wanting to lead to something stupid by the idiot politicians such as nationwide net censorship
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
hmm... I wasn't aware that slashdot made you type asterisks...
"Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel." - A.B.
- Purchase pR0n
- Purchase tobacco products
- Purchase alcohol
- Vote
- Join the armed services
- Get married
- Enter into legally-binding contracts
In most of these cases, parental consent lowers or eliminates this age barrier. If the technology allows it, I don't see it as being anything new or different. And parental permission (mom or dad registers the phone under their own name, instead of in the kid's name) would still apply here. I am a firm believer that parents should not ask society to do what they are unwilling to, and that society should not restrict everyone's access to anything based on a least common denominator mentality. However, I do support the concept that there are areas outside of a parent's control, and assisting parents to gain appropriate control in those situations is a good thing.R David Francis
I never cease to be amazed that the time, energy, and money people will spend trying to "protect" young people from the things they don't want them to see.
The reason for these efforts is simple, information control is the only effective means of mind control. Control what people see and hear and you control what they think. Much of child rearing seems to be institutionalized brainwashing. This made no sense to me when I was a child or a teenager and it makes even less sense to me now at 31, or at least no rational sense.
There is no rational reason to want to hide things from your children. There are plenty of irrational (and downright sick) reasons I can think of though, most of which are a combination of stupidity and insanity.
Unfortunately I don't think this will ever change because that would require human nature with all its failing and weaknesses to be improved and that hasn't happened in 10,000 years or more.
Lee
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
How will the kids/adults turn the censorship off when they reach 18? they can hardly go to their parents and say 'hey, I want to look at porn now, could you unblock the phone please?'. Or will control automatically pass to them when they reach 18, and why doesnt it say anything about this in the article?
95% of all computer errors occur between chair and keyboard (TM)
Now on the other hand, if you need to get your porn fix portably, most digital cameras with removable storage will work as portable JPG viewers.
Seriously though, this really isn't news - AOL has had parental controls for as long as I can remember, and offering content filters as an optional service isn't censorship. Yea, it sucks if you have parents that try to restrict and control every aspect of your life, but finding ways around your parents restrictions (and the experiences learned when you get caught) is half the fun of growing up.
Course, my current cell phone gets such awful reception, it sure SEEMS like my calls and text messages are being censored... Maybe it's tin-foil hat time afterall.
---
DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
its true.
Playboy is porn?
In Europe?
Then you should be arrested and your child should be placed in protective custody.
The man said a 17 year old. By that age you can leave home, get married, drive a car, and join the armed forces. I don't quite see how a few pictures of naked people is deserving of prison time for the parent.
Don't like it? Tough. That's the society we live in, one in which pedophiles are the lowest form of criminal we have, and a parent that would opt to allow their child access to the porn on the 'net should have their rights as parents permanently curtailed.
I first started getting an interest in sex when I was about 10 or 11, and first masturbated shortly after. Now, I don't think I'd really feel happy providing my kids with porn, I think masturbation is a rather private thing. However the upside would be that at least you could give 'em access to something that while being erotic, isn't demeaning to women or men and isn't weird or fetishistic in some way, rather than just leaving it to chance what they get hold of.
I can't wait for this to hit the U.S.
"Your request to 'verizon.com' has been blocked due to inappropriate content. Thank you for using Cingular"
_______
2B1ASK1
I dunno how UK phone companies bill, but why not list the URL's and the phone numbers accessed by each phone on the bill? That way Mom and Dad will know what Junior has been looking at.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
BBC Radio 1 reported this earlier. One of the final comments was that the operators were concerned about kids telling fibs about their age to get around the censorship.
Any kid who listened to this now knows they can lie about their age and probably get away with it.
Well done Radio 1.
This post contains benzene, nitrosamines, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide.
I'm 17, in the UK, and have a mobile phone that I use with my Zaurus. I use the mobile's GPRS net access to chat to my friends cheaper than SMS. I pray this is just limited to WAP...
The really ominous thing about this though is most UK phone owners are under-18... and notice how the chatrooms and facilities will be 'moderated'? Can anyone say 'silenced disgruntled users' and 'targetted advertising'?
I know he didn't post this story, but I thought it was important to note... MICHAEL IS A MAJOR ASS.
I hope that asshole chokes on Taco's dick during his weekly blowjob session.
Things like this? It's just art, right? Or is it ..
IMHO, the age limit is a red herring.
To prove your age, you have to prove your IDENTITY. This gives the ISP, and thus the government, the IDENTITY of each adult user who choses to certify his age. And THAT lets them track the browsing (and other internet activity) of all such users, and target those who engage in any activity they dislike.
Goodbye anonymity.
Imagine this in the hands of a repressive regime.
Now imagine that YOUR government has suddenly gone bad...
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
In Nevada, you have to be 21 to gamble, 21 to drink, 18 to see a striiper, if there is no alcohol. But in some counties, you only need to be 14 to go to a brothel.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Long ago, email was controlled at the "ISP" on arpanet (even though Gore hadn't yet invented the Internet). Email was a privilege, and required special permissions. Today, ISP's don't generally care what you send through their services, but often give "opt in" abilities to filter your email. I see cellphones in a similar state as the arpanet of old, and it's been taking off these past couple years.
This agreement among the Cellphone Providers should help cut spam, among other things such as parental complaints. In addition to this, there should be ways to enter a list of numbers that can be dialed from the phone, and so on.
There DOES need to be an opt-out provision, but it's unlikely to happen. That's the only thing that makes this policy bad, is the impossibility of competition and the fact that a minor paying for his own phone is screwed. The companies can simply cite "go to a competitor that will provide it without proof of age" where there really is none (having a monopolistic agreement amongst each other); and unlike the Internet, you have no recourse to find another provider.
Of course it won't make the "uncensored" phones any more popular with the kids...
First mobile phone.. and now mobile jammer? :)
Shouldn't be that hard to construct. And thus creating a totally ring & beep free zone around you wherever you go..
A transmitter on 900-1100 MHz.. 0,1 Watt ought to do it.
In most of these cases, parental consent lowers or eliminates this age barrier.
Bullshit. You list 7 things. Parental consent does NOT permit a minor to use 1) porn, 2) tobacco, 3) alcohol. Parental consent does NOT permit a minor to 4) vote. Parental consent MAY allow (I'm not sure) minors to 5) join the armed forces. Parental consent DOES allow minors to 6) get married. Parental consent does not allow minors to 7) enter legally-binding contracts. Minors cannot be held responsible in a contract. If a parent cosigns a contract, it is the parent on the hook if things go to court. The minor is not a party to the contract.
So "in most of these cases", parental consent does NOT lower or eliminate this age barrier.
By Jove, our ability to communicate is going to the dogs (with no offense to our canine friends). Don't know which is worse... Censorship in our phone communications, or this - THE GOAT DUDE IS A GONER. Really now, this may seem a tad offtopic, but isn't this phone censorship deal just another brick in a wall? And for moderate laughs...: Supposing I find quite offensive and rather shocking those sites that defend such censorship... quite offensive actually... Wouldn't I have a case against them, on account of them hurting my susceptibility (sp?), causing my morale to go down? (and i DO mean morale;)) Cheers
In the end, there can be only one!
In most of these cases, paraental consent lowers or eliminates the age barrier? Let's take a look at that!
Purchase pR0n: Nope.
Purchase tobacco products: Nope.
Purchase alcohol: Nope.
Vote: Nope.
Join the armed services: Yes.
Get married: Yes.
Enter into legally-binding contracts: Nope.
You can join the armed services a full year earlier, and get married... I don't know, probably a year or two earlier. But even in the case of a legally-binding contract, it's the parent who is responsible, and not the child, until he's 18.
I agree with your assessment of "parental control" software--only insofar as the parent is responsible enough to use it right. I just built a computer for a neighbor for her kid and helped her set up the parental controls in her MSN software, and took pains to describe how it only blocked Web pages, not games, and how at the "Teen" setting, it would cause problems if, for instance, they had a school report on breast or prostate cancer.
Then I explained that everyone had to have an MSN account, and both computers had to be blocked or the controls were useless, and she needed to give each kid an account before she blocked it. So far as I know, she never went back to create an account for the kid who got the computer, and so *his* computer--the new one in his bedroom facing away from the door--is completely unrestricted.
Now, it's none of my business, although I'm very good friends with the middle kid. And I don't care what she decides is appropriate for her children to see. But it's that kinda of irresponsible person that I just hate to see use parental controls. Did I mention one of her kids doesn't have a seperate account, so she just uses her mom's? That's right. The controlling account. *sigh*
Censorship is wrong. I have absolutely no right to tell you what you may and may not view, read, or hear. By the same token, you ahve no right to tell me what I may view, read, or hear.
Will this stop at porn? After porn, will they go on to hacking, and by extension computer science and mathematics?
In other news, a teen was recently arrested for attempting to send products of prime numbers as text messages. He will be dealt with accordingly.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
In response to those commenting on my statement, parental consent certainly does allow those under the legal age to access porn and drink alcohol; I'm less certain about the use of tobacco.
In these cases, the parental consent takes the form of the parent being the visible purchaser of the material.
If an adult purchases alcohol and porn for their children, those children are allowed to use those items. I think the same holds true for tobacco. There are laws making it illegal for someone to purchase these items for others, but I do not believe those apply in the context of the parent-child relationship.
In fact, this is the same way this phone allows parental consent to overrule the restrictions placed on the phone. If an adult purchases, pays for, and signs all agreements regarding the phone, and then gives the phone to a minor for whom they are responsible, then the minor will have unrestricted access to whatever through the phone.
R David Francis
Singing, dancing, p0rno playing telephones haven't really arrived in the UK yet. But when they do, the telephone companies predict that a large proportion of their income will come from 'mobile p0rnography.'
So really this plan is pre-emptive, to reduce the chances of a backlash against them when all systems _are_ go.
But unless the mobile companies also restrict teenagers right to send picture messages to one another, I imagine they're fighting a losing battle.
To be perfectly honest - I don't beleive in free speech. Not entirely free at any rate. Allow anyone and everyone to say whatever they like, and anarchy is the result. All types of communication can be very powerful. Controls are necessary. Those of us who live in mostly democratic countries should allow our elected officials to act in everyone's best interest - that is after all the point of having a government - to GOVERN.
.
It's a problem as to where to draw the lines. Allowing criticism of governments and policies, versus allowing incitement to revolt and install
Then there's what is acceptable in terms of moral (or indeed religious) code. Would we have those who practice appalling acts attempt to spread their ways? Do we allow incitement to hatred?
In the case of this article, it's a question of should we really let young people be exposed to that which is socially destructive?
I say no. I'm delighted to see private companies acting without being pushed.
-- *~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...
First, the bad pr0n gets blocked.
Then, companies block other "bad stuff". Thing MSN distorting search results for Linux.
Then, Governments block anything they damn well please. Think China, US, et. al.
Then again, it's suck a large, complex world full of good and bad, thinking about even a small aspect of it makes my head hurt. Time to load up Desert Combat 0.6 :)
hehe, wap is so outdated why would you want to view any image content in wap.. most phones do some sort of basic html now called chtml and there are many others out there doing some form of html to make it easier on developers.. I saw this site that brings adult content to users PDA's in Playboy a few months back ( Pocket-XXX )but you cant get it free unless you sign up with your credit card so hopefully weeds out any minors..
Pocket Girls. Mobile Adult Mini Mags for your Phone.
Nobody's stopping people aged 18 and over from receiving adult content, they're only trying to shield children from that content.
I know of a 12 year-old that has her own mobile - many children even younger than that age have their own phones too, so doesn't it make sense to put in some form of protection that stops them from being sent adult content without their requesting it?
A mobile phone is as much of a commodity these days as a bag of sugar. You can buy a pay-as-you-go mobile phone (ie, one without a fixed monthly contract that you top up with credit as and when you need to) for as little as 30-40 pounds, which is the price of a few CDs.
So with mobiles being so cheap, it's no surprise that parents buy them for their kids so that they can get in touch whenever they need to.
I've heard of kids as young as five having their own phones (ridiculous as that sounds) so don't you think that protecting kids that young from adult content is appropriate?
This isn't about surveillance, it's not about stripping someone of their rights: it's about not bombarding children with material that society has already decided that they shouldn't be exposed to, and it's about enforcing already established rules on a new platform.
If someone invented a holographic TV system would you scream "surveillance" or "censorship" if it had the same password/PIN protection on the adult channels as regular TV systems we have today already use?
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
Prepay phones would be difficult to keep tabs on, only relying on what the user put in the 'voluntary' registration form (and even then, it could all be made up to get the extra credit)...
The reason is that at present in the UK pay-as-you-go cellphones can be bought totally anonymously. That is a thorn in the authorities' side because the same is not possible in any other EU country. This bullsh*t about protecting children merely serves to create a climate in which ID must to be shown to buy a phone. (Hint: The UK doesn't have a national ID card scheme either. Yet.)
I object to being treated as if I have no rights. I am a human being, nothing less; society has no more a right to shield me from "dangerous" ideas than it does you.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
I'm no lover of porn, but neither do I like the hypocricy of the announcement. This seems at least as much a way to block competition, and to try to prevent backlash when they carry their own "adult" services.
Golden rule: Follow the money!
See
3G network may carry adult video, or Mobile phone video service bypasses 3G.
Andrew Yeomans
It appears this censorship will not be activated unless asked. Which is good in terms of cunsumer rights, but introduces a number of loopholes where under-18's can still view pr0n..
For example its still very easy to purchase a Pre-Paid SIM card from a shop, and have it workign immeadiately, without having to register. MANY kids do that (espeically asian/indian.. i should know) so that they can keep "private" calls away from parents prying eyes. Its NOT uncommon to have more than one SIM card these days in the UK. These kids are still equally at risk from dodgy geezers contacting them. they are already using a "secret" SIM to contact "secret" boyfriends/etc...
Secondly, using GPRS and a computer (Or the P800/P900 smartphones for example) will immeadiately bypass the wap server, and use the real internet anyway, making the censorship a moot point. Admittedly most kids are NOT going to own such equipment/connections.
All in all this is simply a policy of "pleasing" worried concerns, withotu really doing much....
*For those who do not understand what a SIM card is, its the small smartcard used in GSM phones which store the subscribers number and account information. Thsi tiny card can be kept hidden, and swapped with one already in the phone.
Have a nice day!
State your country and we'll list them for you...
Ok, I'm listening.