Slashdot Mirror
TorrentFreak Blocked By British ISP Sky's Porn Filter
judgecorp writes "TorrentFreak, a news site covering copyright issues and file sharing news, has been blocked by the porn filter of British ISP Sky. As TorrentFreak points out, the filter is provided by Symantec, and doesn't block Symantec when the company reports malware news: 'Thanks to their very own self-categorization process they wear the "Technology and Telecommunication" label. Is their website blocked by any of their own filters? I won’t even bother answering that.'"
From the TorrentFreak article: "Our crimes are the topics we cover. As readers know we write about file-sharing, copyright and closely linked issues including privacy and web censorship. We write about the positives and the negatives of those topics and we solicit comments from not only the swarthiest of pirates, but also the most hated anti-piracy people on the planet."
The question is whether this was always the plan. First put in place the infrastructure for censorship -- eek, porn! -- and then slide on down the slippery slope.
Gosh, thanks. That must be why the other ships call me Meatfucker -- GCU Grey Area (Eccentric)
Well, I'm on Sky and I just clicked on the torrentfreak link and ... lo ... their article appeared.
Looks like it was a short-lived mistake.
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Since the requirement was pushed for by politicians (the "won't someone think of the children" view), then the websites of all political parties should be blocked under the same filters until they realise that automated blacklist/whitelist filtering will never work 100% of the way it is expected.
"She's furniture with a pulse"
Free thinking anarchists don't deserve to read news because they're not obedient enough.
Sometimes I look around at the backwards American hick town I live in and wish it were more like ultra-progressive Europe.
And sometimes I don't.
Free thinking anarchists don't deserve to read news because they're not obedient enough.
If they were you wouldn't need a block, you could just tell them not to read it.
AFAIK the UK does not protect speech or press as we do in the US. There are no laws to that effect in the UK, right?
captcha: "acquit"
The NewStatesman is a well known left wing magazine and it'll take any opportunity to take pot shots at the Cameron government. Now I don't agree with the porn filter at all, but the assertion that its *currently* being used to block people off from a large part of the net is frankly b0ll0cks.
However, what the filter may be used for in the future is another matter. Once power is available to politicians they will inevitably use it.
It was always a blatent "think of the children" method of establishing a national censorship system, now its in place it will of course be abused. First it was piracy blocking, then pr0n, then whatever they want to block from the vast majority of people who can't (or are afraid to) opt out of it.
I claim, preemptively, that such claims are bullshit. The censorship is intentional, and will get reversed, but it will be cited as a mistake. Mark my words.
Smaller sites that are just as innocent will get blocked, but won't get unblocked because not enough people will complain. This causes real damage. It costs site owners real money.
The UK protects free speech just as you do in the US. That is to say, not at all.
And so it begins....
Let's also cover tables' legs with curtains, again, because they are utterly indecent... :-)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victorian_morality
The filter is marketed as a porn filter.
TorrentFreak isn't porn.
Therefore AT THE VERY LEAST this is fraud.
What if you want to block porn but not conversations about copyrights to your kids? This filter doesn't do it, but SAYS it does. So if you're informed, you can't use it, therefore it's worthless, and if you're not informed, you'd use it and it's damaging.
Its a plain Big Firewall of UK, simple as that. It blocks free speech.
So the UK is slowly removing itself from the Internet by censoring itself. No loss. And "OMG it has the word torrent in it, it must be evil!".
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
As long as they don't block my access to myfreecams, I couldn't care less.
What they should really be doing is to charge the websites who want to be kept off from blacklist. The charge could even go both ways! Customers would only have unrestricted Internet access by paying double! (or categorize them by several levels ;))
This ISP is actually called "sky"? Do they not have the movie terminator in the UK? The irony...
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
The filter is marketed as a porn filter.
It isn't.
THAT is why it's bad.
We can't have open discussion about controversial subjects, can we can we?
is the sickos that actually post there a few that is..you know whom you are were all for the freedom of speech that includes a PRQ website that advocated child molestation.
the fact is thats sick, and prolly a good thing as while i can support file sharing i can't support those types a people that use it to do sick shit.
"You ain't listenin???" BANG BANG BANG!
PS how well will your guns work against an MBT? Or an Apache Heli.
Where are all the comments about how much better Europe/UK is than the USA? I find it hilarious that today, in 2014, we are talking about the exact same stuff that caused the colonists to break away from the UK and form the USA.
The next time all the Euro-lovers circle jerk each other about how "backwards" the US is and how "forward thinking" Europe and the UK is......remember this example. There are many more just like it.
Its the same olde stuffy stink-hole censorship coming from that island that our forefathers coming to America swore to rid our new country of. They have no moral highground to censor anyone or anything. In fact, neither does anyone anywhere on this planet.