David Cameron Plans 'Radical' Child Protection Internet Measures
from the 4chan-the-children dept
The last time we heard from David Cameron, he was wringing his hands over social media in the wake of protests in the UK. One may have thought this was just a blip on the wrong-radar, but he's back and he's apparently decided that the UK government needs to handle that whole parenting kids thing that parents used to do. This go 'round, Cameron plans to install filtering software on every new computer sold through major manufacturers that will issue a quick quiz upon its first boot-up.If the plan is backed by manufacturers, it would mean that owners of every brand new computer would be asked if there are children in the household when they are first turned on. If the user answers positively, they will be prompted to adjust their internet filters accordingly.Gee, let's see, where to begin. First off, the idea of putting government sponsored filtering and snoop-ware software on every machine in the country may just face a tad bit of backlash from the public. Privacy concerns are the obvious culprit for such software, but so are concerns of parents who may just want to still be...you know...parents, rather than letting the government take this role from them by force. Say you disagree with how the UK government designates a website "harmful" or "pornographic"? Say you want your child to be able to see that site? It would appear that parent would be politley informed to screw themselves, because the government is in charge now.
If parents repeatedly click OK to get through the process more quickly, the computer would automatically block access by any user to sites containing pornography and self-harm. Internet service providers (ISPs) would also be required to verify the age of the person setting the controls, so that a child can't do it.
"Sorry, but if you want to parent your child, you have to wear Sherlock's hat. Dem's the rules."
Image source: CC BY 2.0
Next up, if watching everyone I've ever met handle iTune's EULA process is any indication, you can expect roughly one-billion percent of internet users in the UK to fall into the "clicked like hell through the process" category. This would automatically turn the filters on to whatever David Cameron thinks is the appropriate level. I imagine frustrated adults trying like hell to search the internet for the answer to the age old question "Why the hell is everyone freaking out about Kate Middleton having boobs?" would then try to reset the filters, but would then click through them quickly again, resulting in only more frustration.
"Still not working? I must not be clicking through fast enough!"
Image source: CC BY 2.0
Frankly, it's also fun to imagine how this software would determine exactly what is too "quick" of a click-through, given that different people read at different speeds.
Finally, it would be interesting to hear how exactly his plan to have ISPs verify the age of the people they're likely talking to on the phone would work. We've noted previously how difficult and riddled with potential danger age verification of this nature can be, so how exactly is Cameron going to accomplish this? Unless he plans on forcing ISPs to do site visits or meet with child protection services for every account, they're still going to have to talk to their customers over the phone. Now, this may come as a shock to Cameron, but kids occasionally lie.
"Sir, are you an adult?" "No, I'm a llama. Now let me see 4chan, doo-doo head!"
Image source: CC BY 2.0
In the end, this is yet another move by government to wrestle away a free and open internet. Unlike some other measures, Cameron may actually believe his "for the children" trope, but the best protection of children comes from involved parents. Trying to treat the symptom rather than the problem not only won't work, but it opens the door for some truly bad inadvertent outcomes.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: david cameron, filters, porn, uk
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
U-turn forced by the Daily Mail
The Daily Mail (one of the more disreputable UK newspapers - and that's saying something) didn't like that, so kicked up a big fuss, so Cameron has had to give in, writing them an entire article on this.
Given that this is technically impossible and only the Daily Mail (and Claire Perry MP, the woman being put in charge of this) want this, I don't know whether or not it will actually happen, but it is rather depressing to see the Daily Mail completely running the Government.
Also, this doesn't just apply to pornography, but "sexual messages, violence, gambling, bullying, alcohol/drugs, abuse on social networks, self-harm, anorexia, grooming, radicalisation, suicide"; obviously all things that children shouldn't be able to get any information about... Oh, and according to the results, the second highest category (of those) people said their children had been exposed to online was "other." This is a mess...
Here's another fun set of numbers: of all the groups of respondents to their consultations the following thought (overwhelmingly) that there shouldn't be blocking: parents, businesses, academics, and "others". The only group that didn't were the "voluntary community organisations" (which I think includes religious groups).
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: U-turn forced by the Daily Mail
So, same as it ever was - right wing outrage machine aimed at middle class morons creates a scandal, right wing moron in charge swallows it and forces an unworkable and ineffective "solution", kids wanting to access the material laugh as they can still get it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: U-turn forced by the Daily Mail
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: U-turn forced by the Daily Mail
It has nothing to do with Murdoch, who runs the other major "full of shit" newspaper in the UK, The Sun. They make up the British Hate Machine.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: U-turn forced by the Daily Mail
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: U-turn forced by the Daily Mail
... and the people (including parents); the majority of whom seem to be against these measures.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: U-turn forced by the Daily Mail
Wake me up when the Revolution Starts !
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: U-turn forced by the Daily Mail
when i was a kid, my parents kept and eye on me online till they figured out that i wasnt interested in the porn side of things and wasnt into chat rooms...
on the other hand alot of people i know now arent like that, they dont want their net filtered(they like porn and such) but they would love it if the govt would parent their kids so they could spend more time looking at porn online.....
I dont agree with anything like this net filtering crap....parents need to parent, if they want to block their kids seeing stuff like this there are many easy ways to do it, including scrubit dns and opendns servers that will block sites without need of client side filtering.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
It is technologically impossible to have an effective filter.
What filters they put in place will be easily circumvented by the kids who will likely have better tech skills then their parents.
This is going to add to the costs of the manufacturers, which means it is going to add to my costs when purchasing a computer.
It is the first big step towards government censorship of things they do not approve of.
It will mean that technologically illiterate parents assume that everything is fine and dandy because they have a "government approved" filter in place. Meaning they will not pay attention to what their kids are actually doing online. When inevitably something goes wrong and a kid who got around the filter gets caught up in something horrible, those parents will sue the government and probably win and we'll end up with yet more draconian rubbish.
It is pandering to a ghastly paper and to the interfering busybodies who create their own lobbying groups so they can imprint their will on society... when all the rest of us want to do is just get on with our lives.
Pretty much all I want to do now is walk down to Cameron's house, stand outside and shout abuse. If you see someone get arrested for doing such this afternoon then it may well be me. What a waste of time, money and effort!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
on another note, after the failure of the 'speculative invoicing' scams that were being carried out in the UK, the High Court has just given Golden Eye permission to carry on obtaining the names and addresses of those people, via IP addresses only, that are supposedly guilty of illegally downloading porn movies. if this doesn't show exactly what sort of hold the entertainment industries have over governments, in particular the UK government, i dont know what does!! i think the best thing to do is to lock up the whole planet and let governments destroy each other. once they have finished fucking up the entire planet in the process, the people can then come out and put everything right again. at least for a little while, that is!!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
If you cannot take the responsibility of raising and protecting your own kids, DON'T HAVE KIDS.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Problem is that you have to have some level of responsibility to use birth control measures to prevent gestation. Irresponsible people shouldn't have kids...irresponsible people won't use a prophylactic.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
I don't understand the need here
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The projected outcome is NOT inadvertent. It's planned and expected.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Coming soon to a computer near you...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
No
Guess what half the parents will do?
And when every computer in the country is running the exact same filtering software, it makes it that much easier for workarounds.
And also, the computers are actually going to contact the ISP to tell them that it's a new computer that needs verification? I can see serious technical problems with that. Either you're going to end up with brand new computers that suddenly will be unable to access the Internet, or it's going to be easily circumventable. Or both.
And of course, everyone now has to pay for software they don't want, and an increase in Internet access costs to pay for the extra employees verifying age for every new computer. (By the way, they have a choice of denying access to young-sounding people, or having a "verification" system which perhaps involves a teen writing down his parent's credit card number.)
And of course the whole thing is TOTALLY UNNECESSARY since filtering software is ALREADY AVAILABLE to whoever wants it.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: No
I'm a parent, but this is what I'd do. Not because it would save me a bunch of steps, but because there's no rational reason the software needs to have this information. Any time I'm faced with software requesting information they don't need and have no right to know, I lie. It's just good practice.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Or they'll have MORE time to breed, because they can't find any porn.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
History
"Lord Rothermere was a friend of Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler, and directed the Mail's editorial stance towards them in the 1930s.[30][31] Rothermere's 1933 leader "Youth Triumphant" praised the new Nazi regime's accomplishments, and was subsequently used as propaganda by them.[32] In it, Rothermere predicted that "The minor misdeeds of individual Nazis would be submerged by the immense benefits the new regime is already bestowing upon Germany". Journalist John Simpson, in a book on journalism, suggested that Rothermere was referring to the violence against Jews and Communists rather than the detention of political prisoners.[33]
Rothermere and the Mail were also editorially sympathetic to Oswald Mosley and the British Union of Fascists.[34] Rothermere wrote an article entitled "Hurrah for the Blackshirts" in January 1934, praising Mosley for his "sound, commonsense, Conservative doctrine".[35] This support ended after violence at a BUF rally in Kensington Olympia later that year.[36]"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
question based protection
their protection was asking several questions that only older people would know.
unless you had an encyclopedia or were in school learning the stuff, or were good at guessing.
overall, I might have memorized an extra 5 facts about history at that time, but it really felt more like a mini-game before playing the actual game.
on the other hand, leisure suit larry totally scarred and twisted my psyche into the man you don't see in front of you today.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
So what?
Back doors, ads, trial software, bloated BS software running at all times to send your info back to someone who wants it....
Blow away any and all partitions on the machine, partition however you want, format, install fresh. It's the only way to do it.
If someone isn't doing this, they deserve what they get.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
If ISP run, how are different people given different access rights, or is it assumed that with children in the house, the filter must be enabled for all access.
ISP run filters are subject to mistakes, such as wind power site being blocked.
An ISP filter is an all or nothing affair, with no way of getting mistakes corrected, and require a login to allow different levels of filtering. This is almost reasonable where a mobile connection is used, as it is usually tied to an individual. It is messy when applied to a shared broadband connection.
This looks like a half baked measure being put in place to appease the loudest shouting members of the press.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
BBC, UK Royals, Jimmy Savile, HIGH-LEVEL PEDOPHILES
The Prince and the Pedophile: Charles' Connections to Pedophilia Networks
http://www.activistpost.com/2012/11/the-prince-and-pedophile-charles.html?
Gatekeepers Attempt to Erase Pedophilia: BBC and Gov’t Operatives Still Hoping To Stop Hemorrhaging of Public Confidence
http://www.blacklistednews.com/Gatekeepers_Attempt_to_Erase_Pedophilia%3A_BBC_and_Gov%E2 %80%99t_Operatives_Still_Hoping_To_Stop_Hemorrhaging_of_Public_Confidence/22524/0/38/38/Y/M.html
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
BBC, UK Royals, Jimmy Savile, HIGH-LEVEL PEDOPHILES
The Prince and the Pedophile: Charles' Connections to Pedophilia Networks
http://www.activistpost.com/2012/11/the-prince-and-pedophile-charles.html?
Gatekeepers Attempt to Erase Pedophilia: BBC and Gov’t Operatives Still Hoping To Stop Hemorrhaging of Public Confidence
http://www.blacklistednews.com/Gatekeepers_Attempt_to_Erase_Pedophilia%3A_BBC_and_Gov%E2 %80%99t_Operatives_Still_Hoping_To_Stop_Hemorrhaging_of_Public_Confidence/22524/0/38/38/Y/M.html
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
BBC, UK Royals, Jimmy Savile, HIGH-LEVEL PEDOPHILES
The Prince and the Pedophile: Charles' Connections to Pedophilia Networks
http://www.activistpost.com/2012/11/the-prince-and-pedophile-charles.html?
Gatekeepers Attempt to Erase Pedophilia: BBC and Gov’t Operatives Still Hoping To Stop Hemorrhaging of Public Confidence
http://www.blacklistednews.com/Gatekeepers_Attempt_to_Erase_Pedophilia%3A_BBC_and_Gov%E2 %80%99t_Operatives_Still_Hoping_To_Stop_Hemorrhaging_of_Public_Confidence/22524/0/38/38/Y/M.html
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
All politicians are:
a. hardworking.
b. honest.
c. ethical.
d. on the public payroll.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
This is the UK, so there are no feds. ;-)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Well, yeah,
[ link to this | view in chronology ]