Porn filters to be on by default for UK ISPs by 2014

[Steve]

Parental filters for pornographic content will come as a default setting for all homes in the UK by the end of 2013, says David Cameron's special advisor on preventing the sexualization and commercialization of childhood, Claire Perry MP.

 

Internet service providers (ISP) will be expected to provide filtering technology to new and existing customers with an emphasis on opting out, rather than opting in.

 

"[in the UK] we will have filters where if you do nothing, the parental filters will come pre-ticked," said Perry, speaking at a Westminster eForum on 14 June.

 

The move is part of a government effort to force ISPs to make filtering a standard option across industry and to make the technology easier for consumers to use. As ISPs are voluntarily rolling out filtering technology, it will require no new legislation or regulations.

 

It had previously been feared that the government would force ISPs to block access to pornographic content unless a consumer specifically requested it.

 

Companies like TalkTalk have forced new consumers to make a choice about parental filters since March 2012. It recently began doing the same with existing customers and 20,000 enabled filtering in the first week. Speaking at the event, TalkTalk's Head of Public Affairs Alexandra Birtles said that a third of their customers have filtering enabled.

 

Perry said parents were "complacent" about the risks of online pornography, pointing out that only four in 10 parents use some kind of Internet filtering at home.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/06/isps-to-include-porn-filters-as-standard-in-uk-by-2014/

 

I think this is a dangerous slippery slope. What are the "risks of online pornography" anyway? And who gets to decide what counts as pornography and what doesn't?

 

I think the solution to this is education, not censorship that is fundamentally flawed in terms of the technological challenges.

[Guest broke]

Hopefully this mean an end to the banner ads I occasionally see, reminding me that 'single moms need cock too'

[Chris]

i'll be honest, i think this is a good idea. they just need to add gambling and other less embarrassing things to the filter so people don't think twice about having it turned off. it'll never stop stuff but surely it can't hurt, and it's just a way to safeguard kids from incompetent parents and poor schooling in the worst cases, and their inquisitiveness having an effect on the way they view themselves and others in general. I think the main problem with porn when kids watch it is that they don't necessarily realise it's a genre, and so the subordination of women that is more or less mandatory in 'mainstream' porn could skew their views on what 'real' life is rather than just porn (i'm not going into the actual circumstances of porn actors now, just making the broad and inaccurate assumption that everyone loves their job and it's all an act). It's a very mixed message when it comes to them learning about sexual equality.

[Steve]

The responsibility should be with the parents IMO. What are the "other less embarrassing things" that you would filter out by default?

 

There are all kinds of issues when it comes to implementing web filters, especially as you widen the criteria for what is blocked, but if something like this is going to happen, it should be opt in, although I think it's largely pointless because if kids want to watch porn they'll always be able to.

 

Also, these filters just do not work. They simply cannot know what is porn and what isn't unless they are manually curated and even then, you are placing trust in the people doing the curating.

 

For example, here's how Orange's "Safeguard" is supposed to work: -

 

We’ve classified as 18-rated all adult themed content that includes gambling services, violent gaming, un-moderated chat and sexually explicit material. We’ve identified 18-rated content in the same way as community standards for films, video games or other age restricted media.

 

Orange Safeguard automatically blocks 18-rated content (such as gambling/unmoderated chat/sexually explicit content/extremely violent gaming) from Orange customers younger than 18, or those who cannot be verified as over 18. Parents who want to protect their children from 18-rated content can do so by registering a bar on such content on phones used by their children.

The technology site, GigaOM, was blocked by this, so they contacted Orange to find out why. Their response was that GigaOM was classified as a blog and that all blogs are blocked unless specifically white-listed. GigaOM was not classified as a "professional news site" simply because they used the term "blog" to describe their own site, hence it was blocked.

 

Do you really trust the government to do a good job of this? Cos I don't.

[Chris]

Anything that's age restricted could be a way to save face when getting the filter turned off, just to stop the "Susan, can you make pornography come on my television please?" phone call. Gambling would be fine I suppose?

 

I'm only going on guesswork here because I haven't surveyed a bunch of kids about their dirty video habits, but I'd imagine that the youporns of the world along with brazzers and those other massive porn enterprise type things are how most kids will find porn, and then the more niche stuff is badge of honour stuff that more industrious/older kids will show to their peers/siblings. We're only going back 15 years to when I was first looking for porn on dialup and waiting 2 minutes for a picture of the top half of a woman (then the request timing out and having to reload before I got the bottom half) and as few as six before youporn et al made full length video porn totally free and easy to get hold of...

 

I don't think there's anything intrinsically wrong with porn, but there is something wrong with kids seeing it. Not sex, porn. I'm sure you're right and this will never stop porn getting into kids' hands, but it's analogous to the top shelf in a newsagents perhaps - it's there, but kids can't really get at it unless they find it in the local woods with half the pages stuck together. The only thing is a woman posing with her fanny out is very different to getting done up the arse and told she's a whore while she's getting a smear done (you can have that, daily mail) or whatever unpleasant stuff you can very easily find just by searching for five minutes, so perhaps it's not even that good an analogy because things have gotten so much more hardcore so quickly.

 

It's a tough call, but I don't think this should be thought of as a precedent for censorship and the big brother age - just a way to let kids be kids a bit more so that when they 'graduate' into porn as they get older (and realistically I think 13-15 is the age that most people start to really get interested in sex and annoyed that they can't see/have it, and this rule has a lot to do with protecting prepubescents primarily) they can process it in a more rational way.

[Steve]

If I owned a gambling website, I wouldn't want it added to the filters just so it helps people save face when phoning up their ISP to get porn unblocked.

 

If people can control this via their account on the web to turn the filtering off, fine, but I still think it would be better to make it opt-in and have ISPs send out a letter to all customers letting them know what it's about. But even then, I don't think it'll make any difference really, because I believe the issue to be more about education/parenting than trying to censor stuff at such a high level.

 

Also, regarding the Big Brother thing, there's also this, taken from a BBC news article on the same topic: -

 

The Tory MP also told a conference the filters should be flexible enough to be turned off - for a limited time.

 

The default setting would then return.

So the plan isn't just for you to phone up and say "can you please turn off any filtering/content blocking on my account? Thanks!" and that's that. They want the filters to turn back on after a set period of time, whether you want that or not.

[Steelio]

It's impossible to "safeguard kids against incompetent parents." I think the solution is a social services audit and IQ test for anyone considering having children. Actually, I think infertility drugs should be pumped into their tap water until they get their grades up to the government approved standard.

[Dubba Dutchdj]

What ever happened to the good old days where pornography was a discarded mag in a random bush.

 

It's impossible to "safeguard kids against incompetent parents." I think the solution is a social services audit and IQ test for anyone considering having children. Actually, I think infertility drugs should be pumped into their tap water until they get their grades up to the government approved standard.

Sometimes there are whole weeks at my work where every home I go to is a worrying disgrace, it's genuinely hard to not think "why the fuck are we letting these people breed". The school my other half works at is in a very ruff area, the story's of mums having a fight while picking up there kids or children turning up stinking of dog piss and fags with only half a pack of rich teas for packed lunch is all to frequent.

 

Point being, there's a considerable percentage of parents out there that are impossible to educate. IMO the net does need some sort of shake up, I try to imagine what I would of been like as a kid with modern day Internet access, probably wouldn't left my bedroom much.

[Frost]

As a father I think this is a good idea, I'd prefer it if my lad when he's older can't easily access this stuff. I'm sure he'll find it one or another however...

 

Not too fussed about the gambling bit, it's more the grim pr0n sites, bestgore.com and faces of death stuff.

 

Some sites are already blocked by mobile phone browsing, 3 does it.

 

The 'risks' of this sort of thing is that they will hardly have a childhood and will hooked in by the goggle-box from an early age. The mad thing is my nephew can operate an iPad at the age of 2! The worlds changing.

[DJ Rock Well]

What I really wish they'd clamp down on is when you go to an 'adult' site and you are presented with profiles of all the different 'models'. Based on the thumbnail profile pics you are given, you make your choice only to find that the 'model' you have chosen doesn't even do topless!!!

 

WTF, if you don't want to at least show your boobies then what are you doing here love... wasting my time and yours, that's what. It's like going into a butchers to find they only sell Quorn and Tofu.

[R Funksmith]

it seems like the discussion is basically side A, the freedom-of-speech side, based on philosophical objections to control over our freedom to see whatever we want (this side is also worried about how it might be a 'slippery slope'),

 

versus,

 

side B, the side that recognizes that gnarly porn is a pretty fucked-up thing to be consumed by the developing sexuality of a child.

 

I'd be interested to see which opinion people hold correlated with whether they are parents or not.

 

As a parent, I definitely do not want my son seeing some of that shit. Not for a good few years anyways. I'm realistic and I know he'll be checking it out with his friends at some point. But I hope it isn't the crazy stuff. Some of that stuff I wish I had never seen actually.

[Steve]

I'm not a parent, but if I was it would be my responsibility, not the responsibility of the government.

 

I wouldn't want my young kid going on sites where you can buy "legal" drugs, going on sites where you can play very violent games, going on sites where you can see graphic violence and "shock" videos, shit - even YouTube has a ton of stuff on it that I wouldn't want my young son or daughter seeing - people getting beaten to shit, getting horribly injured, mad racist rants etc. But apparently sex is the only thing that we have to worry about here.

 

If the filters worked perfectly, I would have no problem with it. It would be awesome if you could log into your account and check boxes to block porn, violence, gambling etc. - it's never going to work though and the idea that I, as a 43 year old man with no kids, will have my connection to the web censored by default and even if I call up to turn that off, it'll be censored again after a set time, is nanny state bullshit.

[Guest rasteri]

Learning how to bypass the filter will be a great way for kids to get some computer skills.

[Frost]

I see what you mean about not letting the government do the parenting for you. I hate the government as much as the next logical and intellectual person. But I think having the filter on will aid you in the battle for making sure they have a decent childhood. I'm for it.

As a parent, I definitely do not want my son seeing some of that shit. Not for a good few years anyways. I'm realistic and I know he'll be checking it out with his friends at some point. But I hope it isn't the crazy stuff. Some of that stuff I wish I had never seen actually.

 

Which side are you on then RF?

[Steve]

Protecting your kids is your job. There's already filtering software that can be installed and password protected so it can't be disabled. You can supervise what your kids do on the Internet. You can set it so that they can't delete their browsing history. You can make it so that only white-listed sites are viewable. We really don't need an inept nanny government censoring the Internet on our behalf and forcing people to opt out every so often because the filters automatically turn back on every X number of weeks/months.

 

Maybe we should ban fat kids from buying cans of pop and sweets. Childhood obesity is arguably a bigger issue than them seeing porn. The government could sort that out with a "you're too fat for that!" campaign where shops say "sorry little Johnny, but you're too fat for that can of Dr. Pepper and king size Mars Bar, but we can offer you some fresh spring water and a bag of carrot sticks instead". Clearly parents can't be trusted to keep their kids healthy, so the government should do it.

[Chris]

maybe we should put out our own house fires, set our own broken bones, chase our own burglars..

[Steve]

Yes, those things are entirely comparable to installing your own web filtering software from a range of free and paid-for options, just like 40% of families with kids in the UK have already done.

 

There's nothing stopping kids from reading DV. Perhaps I should take that into consideration and censor any content that I wouldn't want a 6 year old reading or seeing. Obviously you guys would be all for that, right, cos we've gotta keep the kids safe. Or are you in agreement with the government that only porn is evil?

[Frost]

Supervising your kids every second they're on the internet just isn't workable. If there is something in place that stops a 5 year old child from watching someone being beheaded whilst I'm out the room how can this be a bad thing?

 

I remember watching a soldier getting his throat slit on ogrish.com at the age of 13, that kind of thing never leaves you. I not sure what affect that will have a on a v young child.

[Steve]

How is filtering porn going to stop your kid from seeing someone get beheaded? Or are you saying that the government should filter any content that could be considered harmful to children by default?

 

You can already install your own filtering software. Also, there is nothing wrong with top level filtering if it's opt in, but when it's opt out and you are automatically opted back in periodically and you have no choice about that, that's a big problem to me.

 

If you had a 6 year old kid, would you be fine with them reading this site?

[Frost]

As i said previously, something in place that could filter pr0n and the gore stuff would be a good idea. How many crap parents are going to go to the effort of installing software, blocking browsing history, setting white lists, setting passwords. (Guessing this isn't your 40% percent). When it comes to it I'll be using the filtering software and the ISP option, most probably Kaspersky.

 

When my lad is 6 years old I'd be fine with him reading this site (set myself up for a fall here I think).

 

'Big problem'

[Steve]

I wouldn't say that DV is the place for 6 year olds to be knocking about. There have been YouTube videos posted of people getting battered or injured. There have been GIFs posted of things like rats being bitten in half. There's joke threads where the jokes are definitely not something I would want my kid reading. There's me calling you a "dopey cunt" in several threads, lol.

 

But then, if gore is blocked, I don't see how YouTube wouldn't be blocked, considering there are plenty of nasty vids on there, for example, videos showing that guy whose face was eaten off in that "zombie" attack.

 

The government could easily make some free filtering software that people can download, then run a campaign to raise awareness about it. A system that's forced upon everyone, where you have to opt out every so often is fucking bullshit.

[Frost]

I wouldn't say that DV is the place for 6 year olds to be knocking about. There have been YouTube videos posted of people getting battered or injured. There have been GIFs posted of things like rats being bitten in half. There's joke threads where the jokes are definitely not something I would want my kid reading. There's me calling you a "dopey cunt" in several threads, lol.

Boom, there it is. Can't remember seeing that video or GIF myself but I'd be much happier if he ended up at DV then on a gore site.

 

Gore sites are solely intended to show gore with no restrictions, YouTube isn't and neither is DV so they shoudn't be blocked. It sounds like you're being extremist for the sake of this discussion.

 

I've already voiced my opinion on what they are actually planning on doing, would be interesting to hear what others think.

[Steve]

The point is though, that blocking sites that are set up solely to show gore does not stop kids from seeing gore. It's fine to say "I'd be happier if my kid visited DV than there", but then if I had a 6 year old I wouldn't want them visiting DV either, nor would I want them to have unrestricted access to sites like YouTube. I'm just pointing out examples of why filtering doesn't work, in much the same way as the UK government forcing ISPs to block sites like The Pirate Bay doesn't stop people from downloading pirated content. These filters will never be a replacement for parental responsibility, supervision and what have you.

[Frost]

Some details on what they're planning on doing: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23312579

 

Not got chance to read it at the moment, however.

[Frost]

Thank god for the UK Government:

 

 

The prime minister would like to be able to announce a collective financial commitment from industry to fund this campaign. I know that it will be challenging for you to commit to an unknown campaign but please can you indicate what sum you will pledge to this work that the PM can announce.

 

LOLWTF