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.

Re:It's Not About Porn

[eepok]

I'm going to disagree here. There is no significant revenue that can come from the ISPs locking down porn access and people getting for accessing it in other ways. If the UK government wanted more money, it could spend a lot less to get a lot more.

This is about conservative social values and the political power of "think of the children". Since pornography is pervasive but still taboo in Western society, it's an easy political stranglehold because there simply aren't enough people willing to stand up and say, "It's my right to was two consenting adults go at it online." It's too publicly shameful. "Oh, look at him! He's probably a paedo! I would never look at that filth! Shame him! SHAME HIM!"

Since no one can publicly admit to it without such extreme shaming, no one's going to stand up and protect it. Thus someone supporting said conservative values will get the support of nearly everyone because "If you don't support it, then you likely should be shamed because you, too, are probably a paedo!"

This is completely a social and political tactic. Not financial.

Re:It's Not About Porn

[Immerman]

And once the censorship infrastructure is in place it's easy to leverage it to censor other things as well. "Oops, I guess we shouldn't have blacklisted that corruption-exposing website. Purely accidental. Don't worry we'll fix the mistake just as soon as these distracting elections are over. Or you know, sometime after that."

Re:It's Not About Porn

[Mephistophocles]

I don't think pornography is taboo in western society. The idea that western society considers it shameful is a straw man created by western media. It's only used for shaming if a person "needs" to be shamed for other reasons (ironically, extreme religious beliefs are often used in the same way) - i.e., Charlie over there won't carry the party line, so we need some dirt on him to make him go away. Did you know he watches porn?? GASP

On the contrary - the average person doesn't really care what you watch online in private, as they likely watch plenty of the same stuff themselves (or both). I don't have statistics in front of me and I'm too lazy to go looking for them at the moment, but I believe it's estimated that something like 60% of 12 year olds in the US are already hooked. It's safe to say most people watch porn or have at some point - if that's true, then any "taboo" is artificial.

Re:It's Not About Porn

[Anonymous Coward]

With respect, pornography isn't taboo in the UK. We have had pornographic magazines available in most newsagents for generations. We have had national newspapers who sell 10s of millions of copies each day and feature a topless women on the 3rd page. Softcore pornography is available in every single magazine and is used to advertise everything from cars to cucumbers.

In short the average Brit is exposed to a huge amount of pornography over the course of their lifetime and there's nothing wrong with it.

As a commenter below pointed out the media in the US, which is the biggest porn producer in the world, act like pornography is taboo, but in reality the US produces and consumes more porn than the rest of the world combined*.

* https://pando.com/2013/08/05/infographic-what-countries-host-the-most-porn/
* http://www.canadianbusiness.com/blogs-and-comment/u-s-leads-the-way-in-porn-production-but-falls-behind-in-profits/

Re:It's Not About Porn

[Zontar The Mindless]

You were not terribly resourceful as a kid, were you?

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.

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".