[Closed] Every household in the UK is to have pornography blocked...

perhaps till we get to Islamic websites describing how to make bombs for example

@JY - Child abuse images are already pretty much blocked by ISP's, Google etc once they know about them but the speed at which new sites can be put up and usually in coutries outside of UK jurisdiction means its a never ending fight.

However, censoring legal content is setting a dangerous precedent and that is what the opt in / opt out filter is effectively doing. Plus it will be wholly ineffective and give naive parents a false sense of security.

For the record, I do not access porn on the internet but will opt out of censorship and as babybgoode grows up will educate him on how to use the internet safely because that way, when he finally flies the nest or simply goes round a friends house where the filters are also off, he will be in a better position to look after himself.

Every household you say? So we'll still be able to watch porn at work - I don't see the problem.

Where I work the web filter is always kicking off about totally innocuous computery-stuff-related pages saying it's full of gambling, shopping, drinking or just plain filthy content. I see no reason this wonderful new nationwide filter will work any better...

@nealg - what about employers, your neighbours, the teachers at the school your kids go to, agencies of other countries your applying for a visa for (looking at you Amerka).

If they are offended by an adult looking perfectly legal adult stuff online, that's their problem.

I couldn't care less.

I've already posted my opinion online here, with my name attached. So the existence of a fictional database that's been leaked doesn't really worry me too much.

My mobile phone provider (Virgin, ironically) bans adult content by default and I had to ask them to turn it off as pretty much every search I did came back as banned content. This was stuff like "Mountain bike", "Jenson Button", "Maria Sharapova", "David Cameron".

So in my experience there is already a list of those asking for adult content with some ISP's, and the technology doesn't work.

I doubt this will happen, it's yet another headline grabber to hide the fact the Tories have done nothing of note whilst in office. It'll quietly die when they realise how difficult it will be, how much closet resistance there will be from ISPs and punters.

In the meantime it's probably a good idea to buy and couple of decent hard drives and a good printer, I have no useful contribution to make so to speak.

"where the line is drawn" is the crux of this, isn't it.

banning access to child pornography [ which is already illegal and I assume we all agree with this] and making adults choose to access porn is NOT just like burning books

Child abuse imagery is already blocked by organisations like Google, though from what I've read today it'd seem that's not how nonces find and share their material. So DC's sabre-rattling at Google is even more laughable for that.

Opting in / out of "porn" sounds like an admirable idea, until you think about it for more than three seconds. How do we define porn / adult imagery? If we simplistically block images of naked flesh, then we block access to medical websites, art, museums. I visited a National Trust property a couple of weeks ago and they had a statue in the garden of a bloke with his willy out! Ban this sick filth.

How do we define what's behind the filter? Extreme porn? Hardcore? Bare boobies? Do you want the same filtering in place with a five-year old in the house as you do with a fifteen-year old?

An opt-in option to block hardcore porn upwards would seem logical, but that's not going to create the cuddly-safe Internet playground that people might reasonably expect. At best, what we've got here is a false sense of security.

And who picks up the pieces when it goes wrong, are ISPs suddenly accountable? Can I sue my ISP if I enable the Great Firewall of Britain and unwanted images slip through, or my (hypothetical) teenage son bypasses the technology to download his own bodyweight in bongo?

If we're not careful how we define this, and recent history would suggest that the law will be as vague as possible to encompass as much as it can, then it's exactly like burning books.

But the non-Islamic ones are just fine...

censoring legal content is setting a dangerous precedent and that is what the opt in / opt out filter is effectively doing. Plus it will be wholly ineffective and give naive parents a false sense of security.

I dont disagree, will opt out and educate my kids as well

It is still not book burning though

"where the line is drawn" is the crux of this, isn't it.

Did Dave not notice the slightly popular literary trend of the last year or so?
Middle England (particularly the ladies!) likes a bit of filth!
You can tell by the amount of S&M themed paperbacks in Tescos! You know, next to the till where the kiddies sweets used to be.

Also, maybe someone posts a certain part of 'The Accused' on Youtube. maybe the bit that is really uncomfortable to watch in front of your Mum say. Bang the poster and watchers up?
Or is it only nasty rape porn if the players don't win an Oscar for their part?
Two people can watch the same thing and be repelled and turned on, sometimes both at the same time.
The problem is not the material, it's whether or not you have the personal skills to realise the difference between fantasy and reality and the issue of consent. And that needs to be taught at school (as not all parents will do it, and if you miss a young person then the problems will just continue for another generation (unless they find their own way through positive adult material like I did! But that's not going to happen if they're not going to have any access to material that reflects their more adult thoughts and desires!))

Circles of abuse also need to be stopped via school education/counseling. These are the real problems that cause the cycles of unhealthy behavior but no government ever tackles the underlying problems. It would save millions in cash and misery filled lives for the future. But it doesn't feature on any current balance sheet so it won't get done.

Kids just pass porn around between their phones now (much of which they produced themselves it would seem) will it become the norm for adults too?

Sorry for the rant folks but it's a subject that's close to my heart and it boils my wee to see the same mistakes made again and again in the name of 'politically twisted morality'.

And breathe.....
(unless your into breath play obviously!) 😉

[I will be surprised if anyone wants to speak up for child pornography tbh]

Suprise! Who decides what is a 'child'. Who decides what is pornography? Your legal 16 year old wife in her undies?

You only have to follow the media to see it's not black and white. Kids in bath? How about the Elton John owned artwork that got the gallery closed (which was then deemed not to be child pornography...unless [b]you[/b] look at it, in which case it probably is!). Is the peeing boy statue child pornography? How about a similar statue of a girl?

Edit: I did notice you eluded to this when you said about where the line is drawn.

Ban this sick filth.

[img] [/img]

Nice try but basically you are asking where we draw the line not questioning whether a line should be drawn

Yes perosnally I think some stuff is clear cut enough [ in principle] that we ban it. Child porn is abpout voctomes and perps anmd should be banned

What constitutes it and how we implement it is a different question that I dont have all the answers to

In general I am not pro banning anything as it rarely helps [ drugs, prostitution, abortion] whatever my personal feelings may be on the subject

i think with censorship we all agree we need to do it for some stuff but we draw the line anywhere from Mary Whitehouse to whatever

This is just pandering to middle englands fears about children or adults accidentally finding porn without looking - never had that

Quick poll anyone ever found themselves on a porn site on the internet by accident?

3dvgirl - Member
No it does not look anything like that it is not even close to that
Yes, yes it does...

Stop disagreeing with JY, it upsets him!

Junkyard - lazarus

Quick poll anyone ever found themselves on a porn site on the internet by accident?

Nope. I thought Google has blocked some "sexy" sites anyway, no? I tried searching and nothing came up? 😯

To OP I prefer self-censorship ...

Blocking porn does not work but what work is to have either weekly public hanging Iranian style or Saudi public beheading ... Yes, you get the benefit of reducing population too. The front seat is mine!!! 😈

Quick poll anyone ever found themselves on a porn site on the internet by accident?

err yeah, honest....

I think the idea behind this (frankly ridiculous, unworkable) idea isn't to stop child abuse images, we already have laws for that, happily. It's to stop kids looking at images of adults doing the no pants dance, which for me is censorship. If you dont want your kids looking at it, teach them why they shouldn't be looking at it.

Might see hedge pron make a comeback though?

Im currently waching the worst male orgasams ever, lol one guys lasts two strokes..

I won't put a link up 🙂

3dvgirl - Member

... lol one guys lasts two strokes..

Normal people are not porn stars you know ... 🙄

banning access to child pornography [ which is already illegal and I assume we all agree with this] and making adults choose to access porn is NOT just like burning books

Ah yes because without this policy child porn websites are running rife, I can't move on the internet for sites with kiddie porn.

As others have stated, child porn is already illegal to own, view and distribute.

Google, Yahoo, and others already ban and remove content they find.

So all this will provide is a service that creates a dragnet that blocks any site unlucky enough to get caught using the incredibly broad and generic keywords.

A bit like when they said "Some books are saying nasty things about <insert regime or religious ideal> - so we are going to burn all the books in this library to make sure"

However this is "Some websites host content that is already illegal, so we are going to create a device that will nuke any website that might contain anything related just in case."

Hence, a book burning.

Now of course actual websites hosting child porn should be obliterated off the internet, and rape porn needs to be eliminated too (Personally never heard of that one until now) - but there are more intelligence and rational means and ways to stop this happened than a dead-or-alive book burning esq. drag net that will damage the internet as a whole.

Normal people are not porn stars you know ...

To him minuteman is a complement.

"bails - Member
A good post on this from one of them feminist types
http://stavvers.wordpress.com/2013/07/22/not-that-porn-blocking-bollocks-again /"

Hahaha can't read it on me mobile 'cos it's listed as an over 18 site!

Nice try but basically you are asking where we draw the line not questioning whether a line should be drawn

Well, that's the question, isn't it. There already is a line, the big player search engines actively block child 'porn' imagery already, even with safe searching disabled.

Quick poll anyone ever found themselves on a porn site on the internet by accident?

In the mid-90's, when the web was new, I had an ISDN Internet connection at work. I ended up using it a lot to provide information to our tech support guys, so I asked management if we could get access for the techs directly rather than them mithering me every five minutes.

After a bit of persuasion, the MD and his brother dropped by unannounced at my desk (the company was owned by an Asian family, and all the upper echelons were brothers and cousins). They wanted to know what this Internet thing was, could I show them?

So, I fired up Internet Explorer 2 whilst preambling about how different companies were now getting a web presence and so on. I showed them the address bar and explained about URLs, and how sites were typically "www.companyname.com". I typed in "www.microsoft.com" and at 64kbps, the MS site rendered slowly down the screen.

With the brothers suitably impressed, I was on a roll and getting into my stride. Tech have been having a lot of bother recently with DTK motherboards, I explained, requiring firmware updates and driver disks and the like. They probably have downloadable drivers on their site, or maybe a knowledgebase. Let's take a look.

So I duly typed in "www.dtk.com" and sat in quiet contemplation with two devout Muslims watching on, as the "Dress To Kill" rubberware and fetish gear website unfolded on the screen.

After the longest ten seconds' silence of my life, the MD quietly said, "yes, I don't think we'll be getting that" and they shambled off.

As fr0sty125 said, it'll be totally impractical to enforce. As far as I'm aware the only way ISPs can block the content will be by either:

1. Blocking it on a domain basis. This means imgur.com, tumblr.com, photobucket.com etc will all be blocked, simply as around 1% of their user uploaded content is porn. This will affect a huge percentage of users who don't even want to look at porn, and render some of the internet as unusable, embedded pics / videos not displaying etc, so users will be forced to lift the restrictions even if they don't want to view porn.

2. Having a filter in place which blocks out pages based upon keyword frequency etc - this will inevitably block legitimate articles and again affect even the people who have no wish to see porn.

If this does become a law are we going to see it appearing in the Queen's speech, I may have a 180% change of view if Liz will be on TV saying: "My government will be blocking access to Anal Babes..."

2. Having a filter in place which blocks out pages based upon keyword frequency etc - this will inevitably block legitimate articles and again affect even the people who have no wish to see porn.

Everyone in this thread would be getting their internet activity monitored just by the sheer number of times "child porn" has been posted here!

Ironically today I bet Google has seen the number of web pages returning the words "child porn" spike today thanks to Mr.C's announcement.

I bet Google has seen the number of web pages returning the words "child porn" spike

I bet there's plenty of internal IT staff currently having kittens over their proxy logs, too.

3dvgirl - Member

Stop disagreeing with JY, it upsets him!

Ah yes because without this policy child porn websites are running rife, I can't move on the internet for sites with kiddie porn.
As others have stated, child porn is already illegal to own, view and distribute.

So all this will provide is a service that creates a dragnet that blocks any site unlucky enough to get caught using the incredibly broad and generic keywords.
A bit like when they said "Some books are saying nasty things about <insert regime or religious ideal> - so we are going to burn all the books in this library to make sure"

Meanwhile those using TOR and Orweb will continue as usual...

Im currently waching the worst male orgasams ever, lol one guys lasts two strokes..

I won't put a link up

I did wonder who my one subscriber to footflaps.com was.....

if it was a foot long and flapped you would get more 😉

@JY - I draw the line at censoring things that are legal...

@JY - I draw the line at censoring things that are legal..

Are you against film certifications? Top shelf magazines being only for over 18's?

We already have censorship all over the place, this just seems to be trying to bring the internet inline with what we expect from other methods of media delivery.

Are you against film certifications? Top shelf magazines being only for over 18's?

We already have censorship all over the place, this just seems to be trying to bring the internet inline with what we expect from other methods of media delivery.

It seems you are confusing censorship with restriction.

You can still view top shelf magazines when you're 18.

It doesn't matter what age you are, you can't view a censored website.

And your mistake its to think that an 18 certificate means uncensored - if that was the case we could literally watch and get anything once aged 18 can we? Of course not it is just less restricted[ censored] than pre 18

It is all "restricted" or censored

@JY - I draw the line at censoring things that are legal...

you can't view a censored website.

You seem to be confusing what has been proposed, you will be able to "opt-in" to view as much pornography as your heart desires, the same stuff as is currently blocked (ie child porn) will continue to be so. It is effectively the same as a shopkeeper not selling grot mags to 12 year olds.

Top shelf magazines being only for over 18's?

We already have censorship all over the place,

Moreover,

With Internet censorship, you've got a computer doing the censoring rather than people. Films are reviewed by committee, who can make judgement calls. Setting the rules is only half of the problem, you've then got to define them manner that a computer can implement.

Top shelf grumble is fairly easy to control in terms of what's acceptable, it basically boils down to 'no erections'. A computer would have to tell the difference between hardcore porn, medical journals, things like ancient tapestries and statues where explicit (and anatomically optimistic) imagery was commonplace, hentai, and so on. Even for something as relatively simple as the rule applied to the mags it would need to have defined the exact point at which a semi progressed into an erection, which will be an interesting programming job for someone.

It can only mean that William and Kate's kid is going to be called Albert. It is a move to prevent the internet from breaking down.

You seem to be confusing what has been proposed, you will be able to "opt-in" to view as much pornography as your heart desires, the same stuff as is currently blocked (ie child porn) will continue to be so. It is effectively the same as a shopkeeper not selling grot mags to 12 year olds.

No the issue is the implementation.

I'll have to "opt in" to view porn when in reality I wan't to view a non-pornographic website that was caught in the drag net.

That'e the point of debate, it just won't work.

If there was a piece of technology that would capture porn sites and only porn sites it would be half (if not less) of an issue, it's the fact that we all know it'll be implemented crudely, won't work at all and non-pornographic websites will be caught in the crossfire.

Example - I would be willing to bet due to the keywords triggering STW would get stuck behind a crude dragnet. Now imagine explaining to your perhaps overly concerned wife why there's an email confirming the adult content filter has been lifted because you wanted to talk about bikes...

"There was this lovely discussion about chain whips." "IT'S A TOOL I PROMISE."

And don't even begin to think about trying to get access at work/public wifi/library/educational institutions/internet cafe's/etc.

That's the issue, it'll be screwed up and the internet as a whole will suffer.

Worked on a software project a few years ago that was damned clever, and very good at detecting porn images and blocking them. It had a full reporting suite with all sorts of whizzy options from alarms and bells to subtle image replacement. It looked set to be the silver bullet re porn in the workplace. It was even present to Pervez Musharraf when he was still in power as he wanted it to be installed as standard on all govt machines and on all new kit sold in the country.
Never seen it since we finished our work on the project, the strike rate was up in the 90% rate, so blocked 10% of images in error but did not stop the sites.Not seen it in anywhere since then, perhaps that shows either a lack of will or the error rate was too high.

EDIT: found it: [url= http://www.guardwareinc.com/ishieldplus.php ]http://www.guardwareinc.com/ishieldplus.php[/url]

Sorry got distracted, my point was - that even at the most controllable end of the process, displaying the image on screen, it as still relatively unreliable even if set up by the in house team. So, a national system is going to be about as good as the recent NHS computer system and it will probably cost a whole heap more.

Victory for the Mail! Now our children will be safe from seeing degrading images of women!

[img] [/img]

*cough*

Ah, yes... Who will end up paying for it? Need we ask? "You can opt-in to our uncensored internet service for only £9.99 per month".

What's the betting that all this has been caused by CMD being caught with his trousers down by Mrs C, resulting in a ban on grot in No 10?

'Right, well, if I can't have it, no one can!'

'Right, well, if I can't have it, no one can!'

"I was just searching for garden hoes, I promise!"

a free internet is the scariest thing a government who intends to rule rather than serve can imagine. the governments of the west are chip chip chipping away all in the name of safety and security.

i would like to know where the line in the sand is. when is this censorship trend going to stop? probably when its too late.

"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" - Benjamin Franklin

I use my misses laptop,I can see my misses is going to have to step up to the mark a bit more often now.

You get rid of it all from my house, porn, this forum, defo that Facebook crap. I would like the weather and the music and recipes that's ok, all the rest can go.

50% of internet users 'admit' to viewing adult content, that's alot of floating voters in anyone's book. Can anyone think of a single reason why this shouldn't be opt out rather than opt in by default?

All I can think is Cameron is stupid'er than I ever imagined to piss off so many people, or he's up to some gameplay that's not yet clear.

Interesting discussion, and one that affects me - my wife's an internet porn-star.

...she's going to be furious when she finds out!

he is stupid tinribz.
he has about as much idea about the internet as i do about brain surgery.
in fact less, since i know im not qualified to make up rules about what you can and cant do concerning brain surgery.

'Is my porn disabled?'

'No it's normal porn you sicko...'

BEST JOKE EVER

I remember having to phone vodafone and ask them to unblock "restricted access" because it wouldnt let me look at the Holland & Holland website.

Slippery slope? "“The companies themselves are going to design what is automatically blocked, but the assumption is they will start with blocking pornographic sites and also perhaps self-harming sites,” he [Cameron]said."

...and perhpas other stuff we decide we don't like in future.

from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/online-porn-ban-david-camerons-crusade-against-violent-pornography-unravels-amid-internet-censorship-debate-8726991.html

The same article also has Cameron saying that page 3 online would be ok...

Oh and as mentioned above it won't work!

I was initially worried about this, but I checked and fortunately I have enough porn already saved to play continuously for the next 50 years.

So that's exactly what I'm going to do.

have enough porn already saved to play continuously for the next 50 years.

you will wear it out. I don't mean the hard drive.

Of course it isn't the goverment who are going to make you opt out of porn is it. It's your missus. They're just giving her more power.

If they do manage to find a way to block adult content - what's next - file sharing?

No more bike porn then???? 😯 😥

Is the 2007?

After 5 years Australia dropped the idea, instead the blacklisted the [url= http://www.interpol.int/Crime-areas/Crimes-against-children/Access-blocking/The-INTERPOL-%22Worst-of%22-list ]Interpol Worst Of List[/url] which

Under the Interpol process for blocking sites, the website must be reviewed by authorities in two countries before it can be added to the list.

I'm sure if I could find 'hedge porn' in 1984, I'm pretty sure kids could find their way to similar content in 2013.

Lets see "government" & "IT project" words that should never be in the same room.

It will probably be as much use as our firms system, that blocks 1/2 the content of our own company web site!

Wifey, who works in the prosecution side of the legal profession, commented on this on when the story broke on Sunday saying "He's talking crap here, paedo's(sp) share images/video's amongst themselves and use key words."

Ah, yes... Who will end up paying for it? Need we ask? "You can opt-in to our uncensored internet service for only £9.99 per month".

Of course if the actual thing being discussed isn't actually as bad as people are making out, you could just invent a totally new problem that doesn't exist and try and complain about that instead.