'Pro-Tech' University Decides To Block Social Networks As An Experiment

from the in-what,-withdrawal-symptoms? dept

Romenesko points us to the news that Harrisburg University of Science and Technology is trying a little experiment, where it will block all access to Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and AOL Instant Mesenger for one week. It's not because the university thinks these technologies are bad -- in fact, the university has apparently done a lot to embrace these tools -- but just to see what they learn from it, and get a sense of how integrated some of these tools have become in our lives. Of course, I imagine one thing they might quickly learn is that when people want to use certain tools, they'll find their way around such blocks, and access them anyway...

Filed Under: block, social networks
Companies: harrisburg university

Russian Court Orders YouTube Blocked

from the this-is-becoming-all-too-common dept

Over the years, we've seen various countries order YouTube totally blocked for one reason or another. Turkey and Pakistan, for example, have both banned YouTube at various times. And now we can apparently add Russia to the list. Vic points us to news of a ruling in a Russian court ordering an ISP to block access to YouTube (Google translation of the original), along with four online libraries. Why the total block? Apparently, YouTube was hosting a video called "Russia for Russians," which is problematic for whatever reason. What isn't explained is why one problematic video should lead to all of YouTube being blocked, but... those kinds of things are never clearly explained by courts making these kinds of rulings.

Filed Under: block, russia, youtube
Companies: youtube

Italy Blocks The Pirate Bay Yet Again

from the the-stick-your-head-in-the-sand-approach dept

Well, here we go again. A year and a half ago, an Italian court ordered ISPs to start blocking access to The Pirate Bay. Oddly (and inexplicably) many ISPs redirected all such traffic to a website owned by the IFPI, which seemed highly questionable. Why should a private entity receive that traffic? Either way, it didn't do much good, as the block only drew more attention to The Pirate Bay, leading more visitors to reach the site from Italy than before the block! Not long after that, a court struck down the ban as being unreasonable.

But, of course, this is the entertainment industry we're talking about, and if the courts save it from shooting itself in the foot, it will just keep shooting. So, once again, it is going to get The Pirate Bay a lot more attention by getting a court to require the site be blocked again. Basically, the original ruling saying that Italy couldn't ban foreign sites was overturned by the Italian Supreme Court, and thus, the lower court went back and decided, again, that the site should be blocked.

What I really wonder is if anyone actually thinks this will make a difference?

Filed Under: block, isps, italy
Companies: the pirate bay

Indian Intelligence Officials Want To Block Skype

from the as-if-there-aren't-alternatives dept

Skype and other VoIP tools have become quite useful for reaching people around the world. I know that, recently, when my wife happened to be in India on a trip, being able to call her via Skype was incredibly useful. It's a good thing she's back now, as reader Shailendra alerts us to the news that Indian intelligence officials are once again asking the government to consider banning Skype. The reason I say "once again" is that I remember similar proposals from a few years back that went nowhere. The official concern, of course, is that "bad people" may use Skype to communicate in a way that can't easily be tapped or traced. But that's going to happen no matter what. If Skype is banned, people will still figure out a way to use it, or they'll migrate to some other tool. Banning Skype or other VoIP providers isn't fixing a problem, it's pretending a problem doesn't really exist.

Filed Under: block, india, skype
Companies: skype

UK ISPs Block Wikipedia Page; Cause Problem With UK Editing

from the unintended-consequences dept

One of the big problems with the idea of various governments around the world coming up with "blacklists" that ISPs have to block access to, is that it will always create huge questions over borderline content. At least if there's a lawsuit that involves taking down specific illegal content, there's due process to determine if the content is actually illegal. But handing that authority to a single entity with no outstanding review process seems quite dangerous. And, now, it's resulted in a variety of UK ISPs, who subscribe to Internet Watch Foundation UK's blacklist, to block a particular page on Wikipedia. The page itself is about an album, Virgin Killer, from the German band Scorpions. Apparently, the cover of the album includes a photo that many feel is child pornography.

However, in blocking out this page, there have been some unintended consequences. Apparently, the way that the ISPs are blocking access to the page involves a transparent proxy, that effectively routes all customers through a very small number of IP addresses -- and that's causing a second problem. Many of the users of those ISPs are now banned from editing any Wikipedia article. Basically, if anyone from those IPs gets on the banned list, it now affects every user, and that's what's happened for at least a segment of the UK population at this point.

And, of course, this action hasn't done anything to prevent or slow down the spread of a potentially illegal image. Because of the attempted block -- The Register notes the image is still available on Amazon's UK site -- plenty of others are also posting the image to point out how silly it is to set up such a block. Once again, this demonstrates the futility of such filtering systems. If certain content is illegal, go after it with laws -- not a secretive filtering process that will create unintended consequences with no warning.

Filed Under: block, uk, wikipedia