Slashdot Mirror
Report Highlights 10 Sites Unfairly Blocked By UK Mobile Internet Censorship
Mark.JUK writes "The Open Rights Group (ORG), which works to raise awareness of digital rights and civil liberties issues, has published a new report that examines the impact of internet censorship on UK mobile networks and lists an example of 10 legitimate websites that often get unfairly blocked (PDF) by adult content filters (over-blocking). The study is important because similar measures could soon be forced upon fixed-line broadband ISP subscribers by the UK government. Some of the allegedly unfair blocks include censorship of the 'Tor' system, a privacy tool used by activists and campaigners across the globe, and the website of French 'digital rights' advocacy group 'La Quadrature du Net.'"
...could be blocked! What about www.expertsexchange.com? Oh yeah, forgot the hyphen: that should be experts-exchange.com.
No, no sig. Really.
ThePromenader
You evil bastards, this is for the children....
blogspot randomly gets blocked
Vimeo is also blocked on and off by some ISP's
Am I the only one that was hoping their website was www.org.org?
On the contrary, those in favour of the censorship plans consider the blocking of these sites to be quite fair.
Only an idiot would think these measures are about protecting children.
Some of the allegedly unfair blocks include censorship of the 'Tor' system, a privacy tool used by activists and campaigners across the globe
That's a bit of a white-wash. What Tor is is a network allowing for file exchange which makes it impossible or very difficult to tell the identity of the file sharers. It should come as no surprise that a filtering scheme would block a network that allowed for content of any type that the filter cannot operate on. It's not 'unfair' in that this is mistakenly being filtered, it's 'unfair' in that unfilterable networks that allow any content will be casualties of any filter worth its salt.
This is a ***censored*** study. Everything ***censored*** just ***censored***.
***censored*** works ***censored*** here. I totally ***censored***!
Yours ***censored***
***censored***
Having the highest density of CCTV cameras anywhere in the world (London) isn't enough. Toying with biometrics (face-recognition specifically) at every opportunity isn't enough.Trying to pass national data retention laws that would log and store every little thing any UK person does on the internet in a data center for 24 months isn't enough. Trying to extradite Julian Assange to the United States on nebulous charges isn't enough. Putting anti-aircraft missiles (2012 Olympics) on the rooftops of London housing estates isn't enough. Putting a battleship on the river Thames (also 2012 Olympics) isn't enough. ---------- Now add to that list UK mobile/cellular phone operators randomly censoring websites you can('t) access on smartphones. --------- All of this and more makes me glad at times that I don't live in the UK. ------ What's wrong with the UK these days anyways? I used to think that Britain was the "cradle of democracy" with its televised Parliament debates, quality newspapers, speaker's corner and such. -------- What happend to you, UK? Why is all this negative stuff happening in the UK?
Why did the chicken cross the road? Because Elon Musk put an AI chip in its head.
If I lived in the UK could I ask the ISP to give me an unfiltered version? Or has the Parliament arbitrarily decided to be my surrogate dad, and control what I can or can not see? (It must be fun to be treated like a child.)
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Any sort of selection or filtration system is going to have TWO very different forms of error: false negatives and false positives. Missed badguys and caught goodguys. Most of the testing is done to reduce false negatives, so that you're not embarrassed by a glaring badguy getting though. As a result, lots of false positives are generated because they are less unacceptable. Do not expect rationality from censors -- that is not their objective.
The real customer's objective is to minimize the total cost both of false negatives and false positives. It doesn't help until people realise the [often high] cost of a false positive -- a large sales order that was missed & lost by a spam filter.
Some areas like police, do not have any notion of a false positive -- "It's all good -- they needed a warning".
1. ‘Tor’ (www.torproject.org). We established that the primary website of this privacy tool (meaning the HTTP version of the Tor Project website, rather than connections to the Tor network) was blocked on at least Vodafone, O2 and Three in January.
2. La Quadrature du Net (www.laquadrature.net/en). The website of this French ‘digital rights’ advocacy group was reported blocked on Orange’s ‘Safeguard’ system on 2nd February. La 13 Quadrature du Net has become one of the focal points for European civil society’s political engagement with an important international treaty called the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement.
The block was removed shortly after we publicised the blocking.
3. Shelfappeal.com was reported blocked on 15th February 2012 on Orange. This is a blog that features items that can be placed on a shelf.
4. Septicisle.info was reported on 7th February, and was blocked on Vodafone, Orange, and T-Mobile. This is a personal blog featuring political opinion pieces. It does not contain any adult content.
5. The Vault Bar (www.thevaultbar.co.uk) in London. We established that the home page of this bar was blocked on Vodafone, Orange, and T-Mobile on 6th February.
6. St Margarets Community Website (www.stmgrts.org.uk), is a community information site ‘created by a group of local residents of St Margarets, Middlesex.’ Their ‘mission is simple - help foster a stronger community identity.’ We established it was blocked on Orange and T-Mobile on 8th March.
7. eHow.com is an advice and educational site. It provides tutorials on a wide range of everyday issues, from ‘navigating after-school care’ to ‘small space garden tips’. We established it was blocked on Orange on 9th March.
8. Biased-BBC (www.biased-bbc.blogspot.co.uk) is a site that challenges the BBC’s impartiality. We established it was blocked on
O2 and T-Mobile on 5th March. It is classified as a ‘hate site’ by O2’s URL checker
9. Yomaraugusto.com is the home page of a graphic designer, offering a portfolio of his art and design work. This was found to be
blocked on Three and Orange on 6th February.
10. Exquisitetweets.com allows users to create one-page threads to save or share from conversations on Twitter. This site was
blocked on Vodafone, Orange, and T-Mobile on 15th February.
(Posting anon to avoid karma-whoring)
Who thought that blocking a comedy website that avoids "bad words," makes only mild references to sexuality, and shows only mild cartoon violence was a good idea?
Palm trees and 8
Really, what were they thinking on the 10 legitimate websites that often get unfairly blocked pdf? It's horrible trying to read it on a screen, and I'm using a desktop. Good luck to anyone on a smartphone...
Seems painfully ironic that they're excluding mobile users in this way.
We use HTML for a reason, ORG...
If this is all that there is which has been inadvertentlky blocked by censorship, then it should be fairly trivial to make exceptions for these cases.
Not that I'm saying I agree with this... just pointing out a possible argument that highlighting these sites could be seen as a pro-censorship position.
More than likely, however, I expect that there are considerably more than these ten, so the argument is admittedly a weak one. It's only real strength may lie in absence of any demonstrable proof that the actual length of the list of unfairly blocked sites is not boundable.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
The CEOs of these telco companies should step down in shame and go hide in a castle on a Scottish island.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Let's not forget the infamous Scunthorpe problem. Does anyone, anywhere, know of a time when blocking domains actually did anything useful?
You are doing it wrong. First you set up censorship systems and only block really hardcore illegal and semi-illegal porn. Then you say 'look it works all the nay-sayers were wrong'. Then you wait until it is in widespread use in every country. THEN you start blocking political speech. Honestly quit being so impatient.
If I try access the national lottery website (presumably blocked as it is gambling) over Virgin Mobile's 3G/GPRS connection I get the "adult content" block page, which invites me to some soft porn and a betting site that happens to pay for a spot on that page. Like so: http://imgur.com/6iLPN
(that image mentions reddit, as I've lost the pre-edited screenshot and can't be bothered to take a new one, but it was the same page for any page that trips the adult content warning)
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. From the article:
For example, parents may not be aware that network-level blocking systems are unable to selectively filter ‘encrypted’ traffic. ‘Https’ encryption is a way to make traffic unreadable by intermediaries such as ISPs. It is widely used in online financial transactions, for example. It is also increasingly common in routine, everyday Internet use. New browsers are built to check if encryption is available, and if so, to use it. Encryption makes it impossible for an ISP to ‘check’ the web address the user is visiting.
For example, recently BT was ordered by a court to block customers’ access to ‘Newzbin2’. But that does not prevent people from visiting ‘https://www.newzbin.com’.
Somebody doesn't understand the difference between an address and a protocol.
This sig is a figment of your imagination.
I started using it when I discovered that a (non adult) site I wanted to visit was blocked on O2. It's competitors weren't, which raises two interesting questions - could they sue for unfair restraint of trade as it gives their competitors an advantage, and could they also sue for defamation as they are effectively being accused of being an adult site?
Sigs are so 1990s. No way would I be seen dead with one.
the smart kids on the block get their porn from Google image search (all they have to do is turn SafeSearch off).