Starbucks Says It Will Start Blocking Porn On Its Stores' Wi-Fi In 2019 (nbcnews.com)

Starbucks announced that it will start blocking pornography viewing on its stores' Wi-Fi starting in 2019. "A Starbucks representative told NBC News that the viewing of 'egregious content' over its stores' Wi-Fi has always violated its policy, but the company now has a way to stop it," reports NBC News. From the report: "We have identified a solution to prevent this content from being viewed within our stores and we will begin introducing it to our U.S. locations in 2019," the company representative said. The announcement was first reported by Business Insider and comes after a petition from internet-safety advocacy group Enough is Enough garnered more than 26,000 signatures. The nonprofit launched a porn-free campaign aimed at McDonald's and Starbucks in 2014, and it says that while McDonald's "responded rapidly and positively," Starbucks did not.

In a letter that [Enough is Enough CEO Donna Rice Hughes] said she received from Starbucks over the summer, the company vowed to address the issue "once we determine that our customers can access our free Wi-Fi in a way that also doesn't involuntarily block unintended content." Starbucks has not released details about how it plans to restrict the viewing of pornographic sites or illegal content over its Wi-Fi. In response, the vice president of YouPorn responded by sending a memo to staff banning Starbucks products from company offices starting Jan. 1, 2019.

Comments

That's petty

[Actually, I do RTFA]

In response, the vice president of YouPorn responded by sending a memo to staff banning Starbucks products from company offices starting Jan. 1, 2019.

People bringing coffee to work is considered pretty normal. People watching porn at a coffee shop isn't. That VP is making YouPorn look pretty stupid.

Re: That's petty

[Zontar The Mindless]

If, in your mind, you need to get coffee from a coffee shop to bring to work, you are probably still in school or work for now, and have always worked for, shit companies who haven't figured out that the cost of caffeine is easily offset by the improvement in productivity providing it confers.

Or maybe you've noticed that the free coffee invariably sucks and/or the machine's out of order half the time.

When I still worked in the office, I kept my own beans, grinder, electric kettle, and plunger pot there: "Y'all can drink that swill if you like; I prefer coffee, thanks."

Already doing this

[jwhyche]

I figured they already did this. I was unable to get to pornhub from starbucks the other day. I go there to read the articles.

End of an era

[Tablizer]

There goes their profits on "hot whipped & frothy" lattes.

Re:End of an era

[Pseudonym]

It's going to save them a fortune on napkins though.

What about their prices?

[reboot246]

They are really obscene!

Re:can't block vpn's!

[zlives]

most likely they will use some sort of DNS filter and call it a policy... blocking VPN's would actually affect way more people that actually do real work from starbucks. deep packet/ssl inspection MITM would probably not fly.

Re:can't block vpn's!

[ceoyoyo]

Nah, they'll block the obvious sites. They're responding to a bad press attack by a special interest group. They need to do something so they can say, see, we did something.

Re:Net neutrality arguments?

[Gavagai80]

That's like arguing that an internet kiosk in a department store that only allows accessing a store's own website to search products is a violation of net neutrality. Starbucks is not an ISP, they're a coffee company that happens to offer customers some internet service under certain conditions.