Hollywood Studios Tried To Add File Sharing Sites To New Zealand's Child Porn Blacklist
from the the-audacity-of-egotistical-self-interest dept
We just wrote about the UK's filtering systems blocking access to 20% of the world's top 100,000 sites, even though only about 4% of those host the porn Prime Minister David Cameron seems so obsessed with blocking. Also noted in that story was the fact that many "pirate sites" are being blocked at ISP level via secret court orders.MPAA head Chris Dodd absolutely loves web filters, proclaiming them to be the best tool the industry can (ab)use to thwart piracy.
Speaking recently at the IP Summit in London, Former Senator turned MPAA boss Chris Dodd pronounced his love for forcing ISPs to block and filter websites accused of aiding copyright infringement. Despite the fact filters can be easily bypassed by anyone with a modicum of technical knowledge and often filter legitimate content (a report this week suggests a massive swath of legitimate websites are blocked by UK filters), Dodd believes filters are the "most effective tools anywhere in the world" at fighting piracy.It appears the studios agree as well, going so far as to attempt to equate the act of piracy with the act of distributing child porn.
The UK’s Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) maintains a blocklist of URLs that point to sexual child abuse and criminally obscene adult content. Over in New Zealand the Department of Internal Affairs maintains DCEFS, the Digital Child Exploitation Filtering System. Both are run in cooperation with the countries’ ISPs with the sole aim of keeping the most objectionable material away from public eyes…So, in hopes of protecting their business model, studios tried to add file sharing sites to a list of child pornography sites. Not one of them seemed to realize how wrong it was to equate their companies' profitability with the sexual abuse of children. Whatever level of entitlement these companies have risen to in the past, they've vastly exceeded it with this maneuver. Studios may secretly believe copyright infringement is (very subjectively) as damaging as child pornography, but they've never made it this explicitly clear.
According to a RadioLIVE report, in order to prevent copyright infringement the studios requested access to the DCEFS child abuse filtering system.
After obtaining government permission, Hollywood hoped to add their own list of sites to DCEFS so that by default subscribers to New Zealand’s main ISPs would be prohibited from accessing torrent and other file-sharing type sites.
Fortunately, ISPs and the Kiwi government pushed back, unwilling to be complicit in the studios' most insensitive act of self-preservation yet. Unfortunately for Dodd and his charges, the studios will have to make do with secret court orders and default web filters that still allow end users to flip the "hide file sharing sites" switch to "off."
The studios believe they should have root access to government-ordained web blocking. In the interest of not making the situation worse than it already is, this should never be granted. Various governments have already included protection for the copyright industries in some of their web-targeted "for the children" legislation. Giving studios the go-ahead to tamper with child porn blacklists would just stretch the definition of "children" to include major Hollywood studios -- entities full of full-grown adults with enough power and money to protect them from anything.
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Filed Under: censorship, child porn, chris dodd, copyright, file sharing, filters, new zealand
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If piracy is that bad then they should be publicly ashamed of their origins to begin with. Using children as excuses is downright evil.
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FINALLY, something we can all agree on with Chris Dodd. These filters are totally ineffective just like all of the other tools.
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Also FTPs and P2P has to be blocked, but that is no biggie either. The faster we get the web cleaned of all potentially reprehensible material, the better!
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The things Chris Dodd loves
He loves giant shut-off switches.
He loves massive collateral damage.
He loves injustice and lack of due process.
He loves forcing his costs of enforcement and policing onto other parties.
He loves the government willingness to act as his private police force, and even military.
He loves screwing artists by ensuring movies never show a profit.
He loves stealing from the public domain, by simultaneously using it as a treasure trove of ideas, and by re-copyrighting it so it is no longer public domain.
He loves stretching the length of copyright.
He loves stretching the meaning of copyright.
He loves inventing new copyright rights so he can dip multiple times.
I'm sure the list goes on and on. But then the sins of the RIAA are equally bad, including collecting licenses on titles it does not even own -- or even nature sounds it does not own.
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Re: The things Chris Dodd loves
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One likewise would have a high degree of accuracy in equation CA with rampart drug use, high debt, bankrupt governments, environmental radicalism including desert water mentality, left wing radicalism and Napoleonic law via Spanish law via Mexico.
Seems to me that one nice big earthquake that produce some very beautiful beach property in Arizona would correct the complete problem.
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People are using drugs in castles now?!?
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You'd be better off waiting for legal/political fixes for this problem than mother nature. No earthquake will ever create Pacific Ocean-based beach property in Arizona in the near geological future. The best bet will be the Gulf of California moving Northward, and you already have prime beachfront property in Arizona on the Colorado River.
It would be much more likely that California is split into six states, but even then, that fix wouldn't likely fix your issues.
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I know someone who can help Mr Dodd...
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Comparing copyright infringement to child exploitation
> (very subjectively) as damaging as child pornography
I'm sure they believe copyright infringement is far worse than children being exploited.
After all, there are plenty of stories of the casting couch and children being exploited in hollywood. Downplaying the exploitation of children may be a cultural thing among some of that crowd. Maybe not of hollywood in particular, but of people who think they have unchecked power.
But back to copyright infringement -- it demands serious and immediate government action!
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Bad Analysis
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Re: Bad Analysis
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Well, to be brutally honest...
To me, it seems like we as good community parents need to beat the living shit out of these hoodlums and take away all of their weapons and toys until they learn how to "play nicely".
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Re: Well, to be brutally honest...
Obamom! The stupid pirates are taking my toys!
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Because there are no bigger criminals in the world.
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For this to work, Hollywood needs to actively promote pedophilia.
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Next up on Hollywood's hyperbole express, downloading a movie illegally is like killing a million Jews.
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http://www.businessinsider.com/every-time-krater-gets-pirated-god-kills-a-kitten-2012-6
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Hypocrisy of Hollywood
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Re: Hypocrisy of Hollywood
"Some actress found a rather creepy site"
I'm at work so I'm not going to start searching Cracked for underaged actresses talking about creepy fan sites...
However, unless the site itself was set up by someone in Hollywood, these two things do not equate to each other in the slightest. Hollywood could be the most morally upright, self policing area on Earth, and that still wouldn't stop some fan somewhere from putting up a creepy site.
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The problem is a lack of due process
But not, apparently, quite so illegal that the sites themselves can be shut down. I understand there are jurisdictional issues involved in shutting down such websites, but I expect a proper audit of the URLs being blocked would reveal there are things being blocked which aren't necessarily illegal. We basically have a system where suspicion of wrongdoing equals guilt. Hollywood knows this, which is why they tried to take advantage of it.
We're lucky that the folks in charge of the blacklist have just enough integrity not to add file sharing sites to the list, but it could easily have turned out differently. After all, file sharing sites can be used to share any kind of digital content, including the most disgusting content imaginable.
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Re: The problem is a lack of due process
> Hollywood knows this
Hollywood CREATED this
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Re: The problem is a lack of due process
This is where governments actually have to catch up to the new world in terms of jurisdictions, legal status, etc. Most of the sites are probably not located in the UK. Once you start going international, getting a site shut down can be a legal minefield, especially if what's on the site is technically legal in the hosting country.
Better to filter stuff locally, freedom of speech be damned.
If anyone disagrees, they can just be accused of supporting child porn, even if they're just trying to protect something else.
"I expect a proper audit of the URLs being blocked would reveal there are things being blocked which aren't necessarily illegal."
But, they *feel* wrong.... plus collateral damage is fine if it's "for the children".
Yes, that will be their actual argument.
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Maybe it's legit?
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Re: Maybe it's legit?
So? This story is about New Zealand, with an aside regarding the UK. The age of consent in both countries is 16. It's also an independent European (mainly French) piece of fiction, meaning that Dodd's cronies had nothing to do with its production.
Even if that definition is correct, Hollywood and the US definition should not mean a damn thing here.
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this is because Dodd is an idiot. not in the sense that he hasn't got intelligence, but in the sense that he can only use it and the power that comes with his title to do as the Entertainment industries tell him. if he used his sense in the way it should be used, maybe he wouldn't do/say so ridiculous things? as it is, he is nothing other than a highly paid mouth piece, only there because of his connections. without them, he wouldn't even have a job!
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But that doesn't pay the bills.
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Actually, it does. What it doesn't do is maintain an effective monopoly on distribution, which is their actual concern.
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Can other countries get in on this?
But that's censorship! We can't let those Chinese get away with something like that. We're the USA! It's okay if we force our morals on other people.
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The perverts just wanted access to the list of child porn sites.
Like Dodd says, it is easy to get around the filters when you know how.
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Secret court orders
If it blocks access to other sites that have a similar product to the big studios does it rise to the level of them seeking an unfair trade advantage?
I fu*king hate secret orders. We need a coalition to ban all secret orders and rules.
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