Slashdot Mirror
British Telecom Blocks Access to Child Porn Sites
An anonymous reader writes "British Telecom has taken the unprecedented step of blocking all illegal child pornography websites in a crackdown on abuse online. The decision by Britain's largest high-speed internet provider will lead to the first mass censorship of the web attempted in a Western democracy."
What worries me is this could be a foot in the door situation.. It is hard to justify the first ones but then easier for future blocks. P0rn, Warz, Hax all could be disappearing from a website near you!
No shit, it's a good idea.
Just because child pornographers will find other means of getting their porn (xeroxing it at 7-11 for one), it doesn't mean that we should give them MORE alternatives.
Shut the fuckers down. Have any IPs that hit child porn sites logged and investigated.
Child pornographers have forfeited their rights.
It's a crime to block these services on the end user's side whilst leaving them at large on the internet; they should be taking them down at the source.
Good motives here, but are there controls in place to ensure ONLY kiddieporn is banned by this method?
My fear if this came here is that it would be used to block all manner of 'improper' political sites.
Slippery slope.
nude anime gallery
Given that they have a list of sites to block, they should record every access to those sites, allow them to proceed and inform relevant authorities.Otherwise child pornography users will know that something is amiss and take measures to circumvent them. such as by using a proxy to access child porn.
Of course nothing stops them using a proxy to access child porn with my method, but seeing as the accessor would not be given any hints that anything is amiss, they would be unlikely to bother, after they have successfully accessed this material.
SURELY NOT!!!!!
Before everyone does the kneejerk censorhip response, this seems no different than what goes on in real life. Access to child pornography is blocked in real life. Your local Kwik-E-Mart is not going to be carrying Russian Lolitas Monthly next to the Playboys and Penthouses. Nor should they.
The only issue to be concerned with is whether or not the list of blocked sites is accurate or not.
And of course, this will not stop the knowledgable pedophile, but if it can keep some companies from earning money via paid subscriptions, good for BT.
Makes my stomach twist too that someone putting up a site online that's not "correct" politically (government criticizing, for example) may be blocked by the only means possible; claiming it involves kiddieporn, and damn the consequences to the innocents running it.
It will happen.
nude anime gallery
It's not the child porn, it's more that this is potentially the first step on a slippery slope.
Shouldn't that read "attempted by a large ISP"? Could this result in mass-migration to other services, or are no others viable? As an aside, are cable modems available in Britain?
I do think this is a slippery slope, especially since "pornography" is always hard to define... Are "innocent" shots of (semi)naked teens on Scandinavian beaches "porn", for instance? Who decides?
Galileo: "The Earth revolves around the Sun!"
Score: -1 100% Flamebait
The door swings both ways.
________
Entranced by anime since late summer 2001 and loving it ^_^
I'm going to side with freedom of speech (and thereby child pornography on the internet.) I in no way approve of or condone child pornography. I think it's disgusting the way that some people get off by exploiting children too young to fully understand the consequences of their actions. However, censorship is a slippery slope. Once we allow the child pornographers to be blocked, what's stopping them from taking the next step and censoring all they deem obscene? What about outlawing anonymous forums because they facilitate obscenity? How long until you have to get your sites white-listed by ISPs to even be viewed in the UK or any other nation that follows this same path?
I'm not insane, just concerned. I say fight the problem of child pornography (etc..) from the other end. Arrest the people, not the websites and protocols.
...how about newsgroups? IRC? FTP? There are alot more distrbution methods available to those who traffic in this type of material, and believe me, the ones you should be worried about are not the ones who are "surfing the web" to get it either. -S-
one more thing..
i know tons of you will say things like "this is just the beginning, wait till they think they can do this again" and you're right. They can do more, but I can gaurentee it isn't as important as this by magnatudes! Seriously, I would rather have not one child be sexually abused for losing one of those "inaliable rights" everyone loves.
dont' get me wrong. I'm a bit worried myself about the abuse of this system, but for now it seems ok.
But let's be a politically aware and active bunch instead of bitchers and whiners and actually _DO_ something when it's wrong.
Blocking kiddie porn = Good
Being proactive against bad laws = Good
sitting on your ass in your mom's basement and complaining about losing rights when you have no clue how politics and laws work = bad
This isn't a troll, but seriously THINK about what powers we as citizens have (of whatever country you reside in). You CAN make a difference if you try hard enough. Martin Luther King never was what he became without hard work, dillegence and direction.
Sorry about replying to my own post, but I had to clear a few things up. I hope you guys don't see this as a rant but something insightful.
Just my 0.02
The alterative is trusting a government body that you have real freedom of information rights. Say no more.
So I'm more that a little concerned the "solution" is to ban urls... wtf?
--
"we live in a post-ideological world..." - Billy Bragg.
As a matter of fact, I have children. And my stomach would twist if I got to know that they were abused and their photos posted. But my stomach would be rotating if the police, instead of prosecuting the involved parties, is busily updating the webfilters.
One of the most important facts is: The child abuse was already done, when the pictures got posted. With the open web, potentially everyone can look into it and notice it. I don't want child abuse happen to anyone... But it being back in the dark rooms no one has access to is the worst. Bring it to light, so we know, there is a problem out there, and we can do something about. If it gets blocked, then it goes on unnotified.
Fact is: Since pictures of abused childs are aviable on the web, the number of childs killed in abuses has dropped remarkably in Germany. From 40 per year in the Eighties down to six last year. That's 34 children rescued.
The decision by Britain's largest high-speed internet provider will lead to the first mass censorship of the web attempted in a Western democracy.
No, it is not the first case. Remember blocking child porn in pennsylvaia? Have a look here.
In North Rhine-Westfalia all providers have to block access to two Nazi websites: look here.
We can all sympathise with not wanting access to pedo sites, bomb-making instructions and anti-jewish hate sites. But there are, I think, several reasons why this is not at ALL a good thing.
a) Practical reasons. How on earth are they going to decide which sites are child porn sites? Do these sites announce themselves as such with a special logo? Or will the government employ 1,000 people who search google all day for new sites? Or will all sites that refer to "child" and "vagina" in the same sentence be blocked (I guess that includes nudist sites and anti-childporn sites as well)? For these practical reasons and many more, this idea will not be practical.
b) The slippery slope. OK, child porn is obviously bad. And so is antisemitism. And bomb making. So, the PLO site is soon to be banned too? All newsgroups that ever discuss bombs? Sites that sell radar detectors? Web sites taht discuss and encourage tax cheating? Anti-government sites? Exam cheat sites? When you accept that the government can decide what we are allowed to read online, this is a dangerous state of affairs.
c) Drawing attention bad. It will no doubt make it a challenge to get to the forbidden sites.
Censorship has never worked. My kids watch only shows that are rated "mature". While I sympathise with the intention here, the idea of a wise government that bans access to information is one that has never worked in the past and will not work now. It seems to me that enforcing existing laws against child porn (producers, viewers) would be a much better course of action; one more likely to lead to real results.
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BDOS ERR ON A:>
It wouldn't suprise me - since in the UK hardcore porn _is_ actually illegal. They have a law that stipulates (and I'm not joking here) the maximum elevation an erect penis can be in porn flicks there.
Most full-frontal nudity is banned on television, and you can't really show acts of penetration.
So given that child porn is illegal, and what most mainland European's consider hardcore porn is illegal too - how long do you think........
P.S. You wouldn't believe how hard it is to get Google to find a link to 'UK erection laws'. I really tried. I did.
I'm sorry, but all these comments about a slippery slope are off track. They're not taking away rights - they're finally blocking content that you NEVER had a right to view in the first place. Outside of the internet, there is a clear division between kiddie porn and political speech/you name it - both moral and legal.
Some slashdoters seem to have a view that the internet is a realm where all information should be free and available. This is bullshit. If, for example, my personal medical records became avaiable there, I'd be pissed. This is yet another example of information that you have no right to have in the first place. There would be nothing wrong with shuting down a site that listed everyone's the medical history. Same case with the kiddie porn. I'm sorry, but anybody making an argument that filtering all content is illegal should have NO expectations of privacy. RIAA/cops/evil twin want your fingerprints? No problem, that resturant you ate at can put them online(hosted, of course, in a 3rd world country with at best lax law enforcement) - filtering content is, after all, illegal.
The only concern is that they have measures in place to unblock a site that is blocked in error, and that they make a best-effort attempt to minimize the number of errors.
Why doesn't British Telecom simply hand over the details of anyone accessing these child pornography sites to the police?
Censorship in this case might be with the best intentions, but the precedent and future problems it creates is immense.
What will they block next?
- How to build a bong.
- How build a petrol bomb.
- How to make your car street illegal.
- How to hack your ipod.
All these things were blocked in China when I lived there.
The sites are still there! Okay, so you can't see them. The out of site out of mind attitude is not going to help. Kids are still going to be abused. Find out who hosts the sites, shut them down, and arrest the owners!
In fact, people seem to be missing what the actual problem is here. It's not that people download it (not that that's a good thing). The main problem is that people create it in the first place. That is the part that does the most harm.
i dont think this is a very smart idea, not as much from the free speach perspective, but from a law enforcement point of view. the only thing that will happen is that this kind of material will be distributed in other less transparent ways.
Every major child-porn bust in both western europe and the US has linked the end users with the web sites via their credit card, this is a good way both to bust end-users and to get a good statistical overview of the problem.
Also if the sites are actually on the web it is also much easier for law enforcement to trace people / places where this kind of material originates.
I mean, it would become a nightmare scenario for law enforcement if every end-user of child porn actually took the step and started downloading / posting everything anonymously w/PGP encryption on usenet or other message boards, it would be close to impossible to monitor and no credit card to trace.
just my two cents
And what about the first legit child abuse support site they block? Do they get blocked and shut down too?
Or next month, when its another 'crime against society' they decide to block?
There goes free speech out the window. Don't get me wrong KP *IS* wrong, but you don't deal with it this way, by beginning the process of restricting speech, as once you start, its far to easy to add another item to the 'unapproved knowledge' list out of political pressure.
Ever hear of the Salem witch trials in America? This is similar to how that got started: People in power, imposing their twisted views of right and wrong on others.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
but removing this content is the right way. Every single state on this planet has laws against child pornography.
Most illegal pictures the Britons found were on webservers in the USA. You can find data here. In USA are laws against child porn. You can remove the content.
There are lots of things that are banned in the physcial world - "Fire!" in a crowded theater, kiddie porn, etc. There is no reason that these actvities should not be blocked in the electronic world as well.
It isn't like societies that profess "free speech" haven't been dealing with the question of where to draw the line for 200+ years. New media takes a bit of time to figure out where to draw the line. That doesn't mean that a line can't be draw somewhere. At some point I full expect to see a court decision or two that I disagree with. I also expect that a reasonable set of rules will eventually be established.
A lot of people are screaming about how banning child pornography cannot possibly be twisted into A Bad Thing, but it is not child pornography that this debate really centres on.
The issue most people have is a large corporation having sway over what it's users can and can't view.
It's not just child porn, what happens if someone posts anti-BT comments or messages? I've seen enough companies censor their support forums by banning users and deleting posts that criticise their service, do we really want a company able to censor the entire internet? the 'net is one of the few havens of totally free speech availible, and if BT is given the power to block one sort of site, then they will use it as a 'test case' to gain the right to block other kinds of sites.
Next will go the anti-government sites. Websites that criticise the government, simply blocked from view thanks to BT. Then regular porn sites. Scream at me to say I've got my tinfoil hat on over this, but all I see is a large corporation taking it's first tentative steps towards 'sanitizing' the internet. Blocking child pornography is just the start - the company can block child porn and live safe in the knowledge that anyone who objects will be labelled a paedophile or a supporter of child pornography. Then they can start sliding other categories onto their block lists, safe in the knowledge that anyone who objects to it will get the full wrath of the following knee-jerk reaction:
"Oh so you don't like internet censorship, then, do you? what do you want, then, you want kiddie porn all over the place then? is that what you want!" - BT looks good by proxy of public hysteria.
First it's the big, bad child-porn sites. Then it will be the big, bad anti-government sites. Then it will be the whole porn sector, then whole swathes of the internet that do not agree with 'company policy'. Like I said, I might have my tinfoil hat on over this, but the world seems to get a little closer to something out of a cyberpunk novel everyday.
Dealing with lawyers would be a lot less tedious if they all looked like Casey Novak.
BT apparently is doing this not as a wholesale provider, but at the ISP level. They're certainly not the first to do so. Especially in the UK there has been massive blocking of usenet groups for example, I don't remember the specifics, but Demon Internet was derided for being the only ISP *not* blocking newsgroups (or the other way around really, this was years ago).
In my own neck of the woods, even the widely held as enlightened, geek-run, freedom-of-information-positive provider xs4all blocks kiddy porn newsgroups on usenet. And there are multiple "Christian" themed providers that provide an internetfeed that is filtered beyond belief (usually using some sort of server-side implementation of wildly inaccurate blacklists like netnanny); most public primary/secondary schools also get filtered (if any) access.
It's a matter of consumer choice really. At least BT (and the aforementioned "Christian" themed/school ISPs) are upfront about it. And let's hope the "error message" people get does inform people how to get innocent sites delisted.
Now, if BT was doing this as a part of their wholesale operations, that would be A Bad Thing.
I know for a fact that BT subsidiaries like to restrict their internal networks a whole lot; even browsing to another ISP's webmail is blocked, on the theory you might receive or send some (*gasp*) non-work related e-mails. That's pretty evil (not to mention counter-productive).
SCO employee? Check out the bounty
You mean to say these sites were widely known about, and the police had not yet taken action against the people running them? Nutty.
Which is exactly why you shouldn't be making those decisions. Well, we lost some rights, but now all children are safe. (Well, they aren't actually safe. We gave up free speech on the Internet so that pedophiles would have to find other ways to get kiddie porn, and the abuse rate hasn't gone down much.) How many more rights should we give up for the illusion of safety?
And what if we did give up all our rights and were made relatively safe? What's the point of being safe if you can't enjoy basic human rights?
"Think of the children!"
We'll do more to protect them by protecting their freedom.
"Enough of this wretched, whining monkey life." -- Marcus Aurelius, _Meditations_, Book 9, 37
The problem is, once you let them get rid of "the absolute worst", the game is redefined and a new a new "the absolute worst" is created for them to target.
It's a slippery slope because when the kiddie porn perveyors are gone, then everyone else looks a little more censorable.
With all the censorship issues attached to such a campaign, how about making the filter optional to the end-user? That way, if there's an (obvious) false positive, you can still get to the site. I can't see many people complaining about that sort of thing, but I can see many opting into such a filter as long as they can get back out.
I'm thinking of a (transparent?) HTTP proxy server that blocks the addresses, but the DNS entries are still there on the DNS server, or a similar filtering construction.
Such a solution would completely eliminate the censorship worries, and yet give end-users the protection of such a scheme. I doubt the scheme is meant to actually prevent paedophiles from getting to the content. Surely, they'd just change ISP or use some kind of anonymous proxy, which they're probably using already to avoid being caught.
For those of you that think this is a slippery slope censorship issue, think again.
What you are trying to do is link the relationship between free speech and censorship to BT's actions.
What do you think free speech is? Your right to say whatever you want whenever you want wherever you want and make someone else pay to distribute it for you? If so, you have no idea what free speech is.
Free speech is your right to have an hold unpopular ideas and convey them (at your own trouble and expense) to others if you wish.
You cannot use this right to abrogate the rights of others. So you can't libel or extol the use of violence against your fellow citizens. You also can't steal from others by forcing them to pay for the distribution of your ideas.
BT has every right in the world to engage in these actions.
This article is not about the government suppressing ideas that it does not like. That's the only censorship that is truly dangerous.
This is a private company. They can block what ever they and their shareholders wish. They are in the marketplace of ideas and goods.
If it really bothers you, then compete with them.
But don't try to tar and feather them with the misuse of poorly held ideas.
www.bannination.com Two things float to the top he
You think the ISP's are going to go back through and make sure the original sites they blocked are still being used for the same purpose? HAHAHAHA! Then you've never dealt with tech support on some of the bigger ISP's. Yesterday I couldn't spell ethernet, today I is a tech support pro-fessional.
This really doesn't have anything to do with kiddie porn. It's a question about who decides where we can go on the Internet and who makes the call about what constitutes objectionable content.
And, as usual, it's only going to stop the honest people. Anyone wanting to get to a site bad enough will figure out a way to proxy around the block.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
If that happens, and anyone at BT, or any automated process at BT, claims that the site is "Child Porn", the operators of that site will win the largest libel damages in history. Remember that under British law, under which BT is governed, libel has precious few defenses.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
One the functions of governments is to crack down on illegal activities and generally enforce their laws. As long as it's illegal, this is what I'd expect.
Now you might argue that this material shouldn't be illegal. Go ahead and argue, but you're not going to get any sympathy from me.
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
Then you are in favor of shutting down schools, putting a stop to youth athletic activities, removing youth participation in religious ritual, and make child care centers illegal? Better make gay porn illegal too, popular prejudice states that gays are pederasts. Might as well get straight porn while you are at it, it degrades women, and makes men beasts - they might start slavering over the children if they are allowed to feed their sick urges.
Trying to make the world a better place is an admirable goal, but this knee-jerk "it's for the children" approach to restricting the adult world is dangerous and offensive. It's sad and disgusting that children are ever sexually abused, but I am not in favor of preventing it at any cost, and that seems to be exactly what you are arguing for.
[Set Cain on fire and steal his lute.]
I'm not trolling here, but coming from Britain I can tell you that we are certainly not a western democracy.
We're an anarcho-syndicalist commune. We take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the week, but all the decisions of that officer have to be ratified at a special bi-weekly meeting by a simple majority in the case of purely internal affairs, but by a two-thirds majority in the case of more major decisions.
Most people don't know this. We chose this system of government because we believe that strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. At the end of the day we believe that supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses.
I hope that clears things up for you all.
And the presence of this filter is going to help you filter your babysitters how?
"What's next? Blocking anti-government sites?
Yeah, right. Governments change. This year they lean to the right, next year they lean to the left. So what happens? Do the filters switch on election day, to block anything critical of the new rulers? Please...
There are enough people on all sides of the political spectrum to make this a non-issue.
Child porn is universally wrong. Show me an upside.
"Why censor? Why not just arrest the blighters?"
And we know that's not the next step how? Identify, notify, arrest, prosecute. But you have to identify first.
Pre internet, pedophiles were out there, but isolated. With the fre range internet, and easy access, interest boomed. "More, more!" How many pedophiles got their start in the last few years only because they could find this material easily? We'll probably never know, but I'd be willing to bet its grater than 1.
I can do alot to protect my daughter from perverts, but how do I protect her from people trying to micro-regulate the internet?
I've seen numerous comments lamenting this action as the beginning of a "slippery slope". I think this is a side effect of seeing the world as binary. Regardless of all the binary computers, the world is fuzzy. Too bad more people can't apply that. Defending kiddy porn because you don't like the idea of a secretive psycho-moralist witch-burning society is lame. I personally don't care whether the sites are blocked; I just want to kill the child molesters who set up these sites.
.25% murder. Our legal system has no sensible way to deal with these issues.
In some ways, it comes down to deciding on a lesser of n evils (or, in rare circumstances, n goods). I don't want any government or private agency or person to secretly search my house, library records, or financial records. I don't want to be thrown in jail with no charges, no lawyer, and no acknowledgement that I've been imprisoned. Nor do I want murderers to get out of jail before pot smokers; it usually comes down to making unclear choices. And what is a "kid"? 6-year old - kid. 17-year old, in a country where 16-year-olds are adults - different answer.
The abortion rant is similar; partial-birth abortion sounds to me like 99.9% murder (of an infant, no less), while a day-after contraceptive sounds like
So I suggest we assess each action as it happens, and stop forcing it into a binary view.
~, not ==/!=
I'll bet that there were children among the casualties when allied forces liberated France during 1944/1945. Guess we should have called off D-Day. Rather lose some rights than let any children get hurt.
Ironic that this topic should come up on the 60th anniversary of D-Day. I would say that this move by BT makes an absolute mockery of the memory of that day.
This isn't a troll, but seriously THINK about what powers we as citizens have (of whatever country you reside in). You CAN make a difference if you try hard enough. Martin Luther King never was what he became without hard work, dillegence and direction.You just proved my point. The citizens can indeed make a difference, but that needs to come about by getting at the source of the problem, which is the people supplying kiddie porn and the ones that demand it. As I said in another post, censoring is a band-aid. It doesn't get at the real problem.
Karma: Frotzed (mostly due to the Frobozz Magic Karma Company)
Ah, but BT is not a private company in that sense - as the article says (I assume you read it), this is all being done in close cooperation with the Home Office (that's the government).
So this is a government initiative more than a BT shareholder initiative, and in that sense it is "about a government suppressing ideas it does not like". And yes, child porn is bad, but that is not the argument.
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BDOS ERR ON A:>
The price of freedom for information is protecting it all. i never saw what the big deal was about alleged "child pornography" except to facillitate witch hunts. it's so evil. omg rofl lol evil evil. lolz.
.22 and blowing away some classmates. It shouldn't, either. What it might cover is joe, the nice guy age 35 white male sales rep next door, abducting your kid for some sexual abuse purposes. Oh, and thanks to the lovely marvel of digital cameras, he takes pictures and posts on a usenet forum. If you ask me that's not "child pornography" it's just plain abuse. Like the abuse US soldiers displayed with similar digital photos - you might remember that in recent news? - yes. But! here is the draw, the asshole who borrowed your kid to feed some imbalanced sociopathic need, gets a maximum maximum of 5 years if i'm not mistaken and rarely any of those sentences are fully carried out. figure 3 mos - 2 years sentence. less if the prisons become over-crowded and room is needed to house the computer criminals, theifs, and situational murderers.
Notice my emphasis on sarcasm here
I'm with the parent post on the point that the abuse is done. what i disagree with is the little factoid and his idea of children being "rescued" (comparing apples and oranges). children aren't being rescued, there's merely less reported cases of fatal situations. my guess is that at some point the "missing persons" programs which did not effectively track young persons in the eighties, is simply more effective. people go missing, and that is that.
The following things are scary ideas, but i'm going to suggest them as alternatives:
- ISPs start accountability for their users. track users' traffic and what websites they go to. employ statistics against the habits of known criminal types to flag thier users as suspect.
- Continue siding with the war on terror and the witch hunt for child pornography. This lets you be friends with the big bad Bush administration, which likes to go ape shit and abuse indiscriminately, and it involves a grand ruckus of flag-waving.
- Enforce penalties for actual crimes. I'm not talking about crime as in "sasser" or such, but it is well documented that "computer criminals" serve longer and tougher sentences than child molesters, serial rapists, and some other pretty wacky baddies that disrupt a workable society. Maybe there should be a forced sentence related to the difference in age of the defendant and the accused? This won't cover a (US education) 4th-grader picking up daddy's
And some fucking telecom wants to censor your internet access!?!?!
Okay okay we should then censor all church related material. yes. down with god. after all, it has been widely rumored and accepted that the church is facillitating the abuse of children by its members. wait... no child pornography there.
Hmm, alright! i've got it. we'll jail all the people in the telecom who decide what to block. they MUST have seen some evil child pornography. burn them! make them pay for looking at such evil.
I'm convinced that some bullshit idea like "child pornography" is pretty much a symptom of societies full of marginally stupid people. hate crime, abductor/abusers, rapists, murderers, we see photos of this kind of deviation *all the time*
It's like this wartime situation in the US, you have the (bush) administration justifying it and proclaiming its evilness at the same time. soldiers, thinking they were god justified, and abusing prisoners. isn't that awful? lol lol lol omfg rofl gmwas!
We should jail anyone who visits tubgirl.com, goatse.cx, rotten.com, consumptionjunction.com, put them in jail for looking at such evil dot-matrix representations of the colours green red and blue... we should replace green with white because green is unpatriotic (as the United States manages to make everything a "global" issue).
It's not even criminal behavior, though... you could argue with me on whether that's a real problem of society, i'd b
SIGERR: laziness exceeds quota
And just what can you do to protect your daughter from a lot of perverts? Sadly, there's only so much you can do... think about it; hidden cameras in locker rooms and bathrooms, people taking pictures at beaches and water parks. Kids get abducted all the time. These people who do these things need to be shot, but I don't know what you can do to prevent these things from happening, short of keeping your child locked in the basement. Remember Polly Klaas? Stolen right from her home. As a father of two, it's very frustrating. Even those GPS watches will only get you so far... maybe help you find the body (or maybe just help you find a hand). Sorry to be so graphic, but I'm afraid there's just not a whole lot you can do, and when you get draconian you can hurt your children in other ways.
On the other hand, you can switch IPs rather easily, and you can also write letters to politicians and vote out the ones that don't listen to what the people want. You can also use anonymous relay services.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
Freedom of Speech is a very nice cocept. I agree on that, but isn't that freedom limited? Shouldn't Freedom of Speech end where discrimination, racism, hate and torture start?
We are talking about children here. Kids, forced to have sex with adults. Scarred for life!
Stop bullshitting about censorship. This is something totally different.We are not talking about anti-government opinions. I would be one of the first to protest about such a censorship since I do it on my website (here).
We are talking about breaking the Human Rights here. If this 'censorship' leads to a massive decrease of child pornography on the web: hell yeah! if not: hell yeah! Every country should be doing this!!
If it's up to me, go get every discriminating, racism-spreading no good website such as www.stormfront.org and take them down!
42 + 1 = 42
The difference is that the first two were targeted judicial actions brought on by a "vindictive" accuser. The "third", as you put it, is not a witch trial in any sense of the Salem trials or McCarthey trials. Noone's work has been blacklisted, no opinion made illegal, no person unduely arrested, much less executed as in Salem.
... I mean, hell, it's the anniversary of D-Day, when a whole lot more people died in one battle on one day than the most recent war in 4 months across a nation... perspective.
The Dixie Chicks still hold concerts. Half of the Senate are vocal opponents of the administration's policies on terrorism. Michael Moore still got his movie out, and he's won a few awards I hear. Speaking out against authority today is nothing like how it was in ages past.
It's one thing to learn from history, but it's another to realize what portion of history is fact and what is propaganda. It's best that we all learn perspective from the past, instead of blindly believing what we are told today
Never?
I don't think you're aware how Freenet works. If you did, you'd realize that it's nearly impossible to block.
1. Random ports. Since there's no standard port, there's nothing to block unless the ISP just blocked everything, but... they'd lose the majority of their customer base.
2. Encrypted data. No one will be able to see what you're transmitting, so there's no pattern to filter.
3. Decentralized. Like Gnutella, there's no central server that houses Freenet node information and locations.
Even if they DID make laws to ban freenet itself, short of installing a camera in front of your monitor or software to monitor what's running, it's impossible to detect who's using it.
We have secretly replaced these Slashdot mods' sense of humor with a rusty nail. Let's see if they notice!!
BT provides Internet access to their customers. The customer types in the URL of a porn site, which is passed through BT till it finds the site, at which time the sending server packets it all up and sends it back, through BT to the user.
BT in effect is rebroadcasting the offending material, and it is their right and responsibility to ensure they are not transmitting or resending child porn. I see this as BT not so much blocking a site, but preventing illegal materials to be transmitted through their facilities.
Pete Carr Owner Chatmag.com
I think it's a sad and telling statement about our society that every poster in this thread who criticized this decision also felt compelled to include a disclaimer, "I do not support child pornography."
That fact is what makes actions like this insidious. You begin by pushing an issue that is so black-&-white, it's nearly indefensible. You begin by condemning something that absolutely no one wants to support. And you gain momentum.
crib
Please don't read my journal
> Seriously, I would rather have not one child be sexually abused for losing one of those "inaliable rights" everyone loves.
Woah woah woah, you're making a BIG leap here. British Telecom is talking about banning websites that show child pornography, which is NOT the same thing as stopping the child pornography from ever being made. Child porn isn't like, say, deordorant. Without a large enough market to justify the sale of deodorant, people wouldn't make it. It's cost prohibitive. Child porn, however, has intrinsic value for the people who make it. There isn't really any profit motive in making kiddie porn. This issue is totally distinct from any other illegal item because the act itself involves things which are already in existance and cannot be regulated, namely adults with an appetite for children and children. It isn't like marijuana or alchohol where you can find the plants or bottles and distroy them.
What you're suggesting is an economic solution to a sociological and psychological problem. It's not as easy or as simple, but the only solution to a sociological/psychological problem is a sociological/psychological solutuion. I don't know what it would be, I'm not a psychologist or a member of a think tank with a lot of time to devote to the issue, but I'm sure as hell there's a better solution that the one that BT is proposing.
To review:
understanding of economics = good
desire for a quick fix instead of a solution to a complex problem = bad, and way to frequent these days.
The dream reveals the reality which conception lags behind. That is the horror of life- the terror of art. -Franz Kafka
I built and manage a Usenet binaries site (one of the original ones, but now sadly in need of an update and, since Cidera bit it, not terribly complete). A lot of pure Usenet servers (no binaries decoding) make all newsgroups available under the hope that common carrier law will apply if (when) the shit hits the fan, but we suspected early on that common carrier law wouldn't apply as we were decoding and thumbnailing images. Thus, one of the first things I did when I wrote the code was to create an MD5 checksum database to block images. Anything that appeared in a known KP group would be be checksummed and added to the database, and anything anywhere else with a checksum in the database would be blocked (a good idea, since pedophiles change newsgroups frequently, and commonly take over abandoned groups in alt.*). New or newly active newsgroups were quarantined, no image decoding but with the subject lines presented in a report for our review. We could tell fairly quickly whether a newsgroup should go into the blocklist just based on the subject lines and content filenames.
A few years ago I had occasion to speak to law enforcement (police and FBI) who were investigating someone for KP possession, and he had a subscription to our site. They decided we weren't the source (biggest sigh of relief in my life) but were interested in our blacklist system and wanted a copy of our blacklist database. I spoke with one guy (FBI if I recall correctly) for an hour or so and I got to hear more than I ever wanted to know about KP on the net. Here's what he told me. He seemed to know what he was talking about (and seemed to be rather discouraged by the whole mess) but for all I know it could be bullshit.
There are three major sources of KP on the net. The first, present in Usenet but not on the web, is scans from magazines and such that were, at one time, legal to possess, but were criminalized during the Reagan administration (I think). As you might imagine the sickos who had stacks of "lolita" magazines weren't exactly rushing to turn them in to the cops. Once scanners became available, people started scanning in images and distributing them. Now, the original scanners' series are passed back and forth endlessly on Usenet and probably will be until the end of time. Fortunately, they're pretty easy to block by name and checksum.
The second and by far largest major category of KP on the net is softcore websites (nudity and sexually suggestive poses, but no penetration or sex acts), and reposts of same on Usenet. I'd always assumed this meant casual nudity (like nudist camp photos) but the guy I spoke with corrected me and said a lot of them are highly sexual poses and attire, with genital closeups. There are only a handful of major companies involved, each one runs multiple websites, and they tend to use the same limited number of "models" (i.e., exploited kids).
And "exploited" is the right word. Regardless of the fact that there's no penetration involved, these are poor kids making very little money for themselves and a shitload for the websites, and IMO it's similar to (tho not as bad as) parents selling their kids into prostitution. But in the areas where this occurs (largely but not exclusively former Soviet republics), it's legal, or in some cases just ignored because the cops are bribed or have bigger concerns to worry about (like actual child prostitution, organized crime, etc.)
The third category, appearing on Usenet and P2P networks but not the web, is hardcore material produced by the same evil fucks who are raping the kids. There's no money involved, but most of it is privately traded (or posted encrypted on Usenet with keys exchanged privately) and to be admitted to trading circles you either have to find rare content or produce your own stuff. So this *definitely*
This last is a major issue. It's similar to the "hate speech" issue on college campuses. It would be a great excuse for, say, blocking Aljazeera. (They have cool anti-American cartoons, in Flash. Some of them are anti-white-people.)
And the where do you draw the line argument holds little water. In every avenue of deciding what is permissable in society there are people making judgements of reasonableness. There are very few black and white issues, but that doesn't and shouldn't stop people tackling the worst of the problems.
My mother has pictures of me as a young child taking a bath in her wash tub. She also has many pictures of my brothers and sisters and I swimming in the local watering hole. We're all starkers. They're all in her old photo albums - she even used some of them as part of a collage at my HS grauation party as part of a "roast the grad" display. Is my mother a child pornographer? What if one of the guests looked at it a little too long? Obviously that makes them a pedophile and they should be locked away.
My brother just e-mailed me a picture of my niece playing in her wading pool - topless! What about pictures of my wife on the beach (in her bathing suit) with someone else's topless child in the background? Is that kiddy porn? My local hospital has a large full-color poster of about a dozen toddlers, lined up "cheek-to-cheek", with some sort of cute saying on it? KP? Why not? Are the toddlers too young?
What about a picture of a 12 year old girl in her underwear? That can't ever be right! Except in the Sears catalog. But only pedophiles read that section right? Is Sears contributing to the lust of pedophiles? Boycot them!
What about that Discovery Channel show about growing up and aging where they line up 100 people from infant to 100 years old, one for every age, all naked?
The argument for pornography, and by extension, kiddy porn, is "I'll know it when I see it". The problem with that argument is that what is one person's porn is another person's art (or research, or marketing, or memories, etc). Another problem with "kiddy porn" is that the subject is SO taboo and SO reprehensible that there is an instant knee-jerk reaction to it without any rational thought.
Even my questioning the "status-quo" like this will invariably brand me as a pedophile. This makes about as much sense as my being branded a terrorist because I question the effectiveness of "security measures" that substantially inconvenience me and terribly embarrased my 14 year old daughter who was "caught" wearing an underwire bra on our trip to Europe and had to be "felt-up" by "the lady", in front of everyone.
The cry is: "It's for security!"or "It's for the Children!". Well, security is good - if not taken to mindless extremes, and protecting children is also good. But are we really about protecting the children? If so, why is is so easy for people to find KP online but so hard for the police to find it and shut it down? And, as another poster pointed out, what about totaly computer generated or hand-drawn material? What happens when "no children were harmed in the making of this film?".
Yeah, I know, "the material will fuel the lusts of the demented pedophile" and he will therefore be forced to hunt down neighborhood kids. Just like my neighbor downloading pictures from alt.sex.bdsm.* will force him to become a sadistice rapist, or like playing GTA will force the my son to steal cars and run down pedestrians or, God forbid, the next time I see a cross-post of bestiality, I'm going to just have to take out after my poor dog.
OK, I'll admit that I'm stretching the connections a bit. But it seems to me that trying to censor the end-user is not the solution. While it MAY help those who use Internet Exploder from being "accidentally" exposed to KP when their computer get hijacked and bombarded with pop-ups, shouldn't the effort be focussed on finding the people who are actually exploiting these poor children? And don't tell me that viewing a cross-post on Usenet is "contributing to the exploitation". I didn't ask for it, I didn't pay for it, and I'm sure as hell not gonna act on it.
In my personal opinion, people who get sexually excited by looking at pre-pubescent children have a phlychological problem, just like people who look at a pony and get that "special feeling". But, and I'm going out on a limb here, I'd be willing to bet that, of those who don't just view ALL pornography as wrong, a vast majority prefer to look at younger,
"terrorism" and "pedophilia" are the root passwords to the Constitution
You force your opponents to take an unpopular stance. Just as "Give Sen.Corruptus Money And Power In Order To Save The Children" is becoming tired and cliched, "Give Sen.Corruptus Money And Power To Save Us From Nukulor Terrism" is on the wane, but "Give Sen.Corruptus Money And Power To Save Us From The Pedophile Menace" is a fresh and new scam. You won't give Sen.Corruptus money and power? How dare you support pedophillia!
Forget that most sexually molested kids are interfered with by their relatives or even their parents, the thing that people fear the most is evil strangers, hiding in the bushes in children's playgrounds, "grooming" children on the internet, jerking off to strangers' baby photos. The press have whipped the public into an absolute hysteria over the Evil Pedophile Menace, and it's fertile political capital for anything you want to do.
The first thing any opponent of yours has to do is concede that Pedophiles Are Evil Agents Of Satan, which is basically agreeing with 99% of whatever you propose to do. If he doesn't, then He Is Siding With Those Evil Monsters. His hands are completely tied. All he can propose is something even stronger and accept your position even more than you do. Of course, your proposal will do fuck all to save anyone, let alone the children, from the pedophiles. It's all a ruse to get money and power. But if anyone dares suggest that, They Are In League With The Sick Pedo Beasts.
Although I agree with most of your post, I have to tackle this one puzzling line:
Point is that even paedophiles can abandon this personality once they realize that it's utter nonsense to maintain it.
I don't think so. If you're a 'normal' male, could you just 'abandon' your personality of finding 17 - 30 year old women attractive? Could you just stop wanting to sleep with them, stop looking at them as something other than a regular person, stop the deep, deep feelings you have towards them and start wanting to shag men instead, because that's what society found acceptable?
I couldn't.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
As well what is the definition of 'kiddy porn'. Is simple naked children, i.e. nudist web pages, kiddy porn? In many places that *is* becoming the standard: take a picture of your children bathing and you goto jail.
Is this painting the next to be blocked? This one or perhaps this?
Perhaps spamming such art around would desensitize people to the hysteria that has developed over the past 20 years surrounding this topic.
3dinfo@maficstudios.com
Fact is we are not talking about blocking warez or porn or music sites, we are talking about blocking blocking child explotation sites.
Uhm, nope, the fact is we are talking about blocking sites that, as determined by the law contain child exploitation content.
Another fact is, this also means we are talking about supression of speach.
There are many reasons why this is wrong.
The goal of preventing child exploitation is to prevent a "child" from having sexual encounters until the child knows what sex is and is mature enough to make decisions that will effect his/her life.
Many would consider a child/person that reaches this maturity level to be an adult.
The law would consider this person to in fact be a child. And reality has a person that is a natural adult that is legally a child.
Usually the major factor in determining child exploitation is age.
Children learn about sex at different ages. Children also mature mentally as a function of their biology and their surroundings, etc...
So now we wonder, should the law be based on natural maturity which can not be measured or a predetermined age? Well, since you cant measure maturity and exploitation can not be tolerated and most certainly would still exist and be exploited if the law were to be based on maturity, the obvious choice is age.
We have been looking at the law on the childrens side, but child exploitation has to have a child and an adult involved. So lets look at it from the adults perspective a little...
No law in the world is going to be able to stop a natural-adult/legal-child from accidentaly flirting with someone that is a legal adult.
Also, where should the law stand when a legal child lies about their age to an adult? Many would think thats not the fault of the adult. But the law generally will not punish the child and the adult will go to jail.
Should the law be allowed to basically enforce "no sexual/erotic encounters until positive identification is insured"?
Should the law allow suppression of speach as long as its for the children?
So when you ask yourself "do I think this is ok?" you must ask yourself if you think its ok for supression of speach to be merged with laws that are so grey even if it is for the children. If it is allowed then suprression of speach will be legally grey, even though most people would consider it to be black. This is obviously not a good scenario.
Since supression of speach for this reason will not eliminate the exploitation and has many chances of incriminating (what many would think to be) innocent people, I believe the law should find another way.
And I'll finish up with something other slashdoters and the Bush administration has made clear...
Ya give an inch, they take a mile.
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt. --E.C. Stanton