The UK's War On Porn: Turning ISPs Into Parents

New submitter SMABSA writes: With British Prime Minister David Cameron announcing plans for porn users to be required to register their bank account/debit card as a means of age verification, Spiked-Online writer Stephen Beard explores the privacy implications, technical feasibility and motivations of such a plan. Here's an excerpt that gives a feel for Beard's take: Not only are the plans to regulate porn sites intrusive, they are also technically infeasible (as are many bright ideas that come from central government). In the amount of time, for example, it would take to identify a site not complying with the new rules, that site could be mirrored multiple times. Such ineffectiveness has been evident in the government’s futile attempts to censor torrent tracker Pirate Bay. The posturing about protecting children is irksome, too. To pretend that children in decades past haven’t been sneaking a look at mucky images, albeit in magazines and newspapers, is naive at best.

Comments

It's Not About Porn

[Mephistophocles]

The government knows damn well that ideas like this are unenforceable. It's not about banning porn anymore than it's about protecting children (as if the government gives a shit about your kids safety). It's about revenue. You can't keep kids from seeing porn - but you can fine the hell out of anyone you catch not following the law. The harder it is to follow the law, the better! If nobody can actually be compliant, then everyone pays a fine.

Re:It's Not About Porn

[Blue Stone]

The UK government, as do many others around the world, is just playing to a particular enclave of their supporters to gain political capital at the expense of others.

All this will do is kill a certain proportion of UK porn websites and enthusiasts (ahem) will look elsewhere; abroad.

That pesky international internet, eh?

Never mind, though, some dopey true-blue grannies will tell the bridge club what a good job the Tories are doing protecting their grand children. Even though they're not.

Re:It's Not About Porn

[Mephistophocles]

All this will do is kill a certain proportion of UK porn websites...

My point is that shutting down porn sites (following the rules or otherwise) isn't the goal. In fact, if I'm right about it being more about revenue than anything else, shutting down these sites runs contrary to the actual goal - because a shut down site can't pay a fine. Crusades like this never produce real results - there may be an "example" or two made in the beginning, but that's just more about continuing the program and keeping a few thousand overpaid bureaucrats in a job - i.e., making sure the funding keeps on coming. Fines and tax revenue make sure that gravy train never stops - so in the end, it's just tool for channeling all real money to the ruling class. Jerk off to your silly porn all you want, peasant.

If the government really cared about shutting down porn sites, they'd just shut them down, and no, it wouldn't be impossible. If GHCQ and the NSA can record and archive every single voice call in the developed world, and build a search engine for finding single phrases in those calls at will, then they know damn well what you're watching online and whether or not it's "legit" or not. Similarly, making porn impossible (or so difficult as to be utterly impractical for all but the most die-hard) to obtain would be relatively trivial.

Page 3 wasn't enough?

[Anonymous Coward]

British kids have had Page 3 girls forever. Why weren't people blaming that for the collapse of society?

Yes and no

[Anonymous Coward]

It's definitely about money, not outcome -- but it's not the fines they're after. That's chump change to government. It's the adminstration costs, which will not only dwarf the revenue from fines, but set a precedent for the next round of government expansions.

UK Big Brother

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought the UK had left the Mary Whitehouse times behind? Apparently the UK government needs another bogeyman to distract people from the issues it's not like they haven't forced UK ISPs to have a family friendly filter turned ON by default. Guessing that didn't work the way they wanted to but hey ... politicians wont admit failure.

Re:More stupid CONservative posts

[MBGMorden]

We get it. The new rulers of /. are Republicans and hate us.

You do realize that Republicans (at least publicly) are generally the ones that are the most against porn right?

I swear I wish I could found the "Hands off" party with the simple goal of not messing with people.

Guns? It's a constitutional right - don't mess with them.
Porn? Same. Leave it alone.
Video games? It's not turning kids into murderers. Leave them alone too.
Weed? Doesn't harm anyone else. Legalize it.
Prostitution? As long as its between consenting adults (and if it's not its rape, not prostitution anyways), then legalize it too.

Each party is pandering to their respective bases trying to ban whatever that group doesn't like - I just want politicians to leave things alone for once.

Re:More stupid CONservative posts

[Coren22]

Perhaps if that is your feeling, you should call a constitutional convention to have the constitution amended to correct the error of our forefathers. Either that or shut the fuck up and stop trying to take other's rights away from them because you don't agree with them.

It's about control.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

The government knows damn well that ideas like this are unenforceable. It's not about banning porn anymore than it's about protecting children (as if the government gives a shit about your kids safety). It's about revenue.

No, it's about control.

This gives them the camel's nose into the tent on controlling content. Chipping away at some basic rightalways starts with going after some unpopular behavior - pornography, child molestation, incest, etc. - and setting a precedent that the right isn't absolute. Once this is done, and the right converted to a privilege, there is the matter of setting the line defining what behavior is still allowed - a subset that steadily shrinks. Anyone who calls them on it, of course, can be labelled a supporter of pornography, child molestation, incest, etc., helping them get the initial precedent set.

Meanwhile, when the "protective measures" don't work, the government will use the failure as an excuse to impose progressively more, and more draconian, interventions. So they both increase the amount of behavior they claim to "legitimately" prohibit and the tools they claim to "legitimately" use to enforce the prohibitions.

Of course it isn't the pornographers, child molesters, and such that they're after. Its their political opposition. (Money too, of course, and anyone doing anything that interferes with their wishes.)

The harder it is to follow the law, the better! If nobody can actually be compliant, then everyone pays a fine.

More importantly: When nobody can follow the law they can bust anybody at their whim. The rule of law is replaced by the rule of the police - the definition of a "police state".

Re:More stupid CONservative posts

[Coren22]

When the text of the amendment reads as such:

the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

it really makes you wonder when people then try to claim it is perfectly acceptable to infringe on the rights of gun owners. How would you feel if I was campegning to take away the right of everyone to speak out against the federal government? After all, many countries today feel it is perfectly acceptable to take this right from their people, so it must be the one and only path to true enlightenment.

Feel free to call the constitutional convention, just don't be surprised when your amendments fail.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/179...

Less than half of Americans feel the laws need to be stricter. Last I checked, it requires a 2/3 majority to amend the constitution.