Surfing with Cleanfeed
The Guardian Online has an article about Internet filtering that points up a lot of the problems with the technology - like the fact that it is expensive to implement and does not work anyway
There's just one problem. ISPs say the costs are huge, running to hundreds of thousands of pounds for a large provider, and that the suggested filters are easily circumvented.It goes on to quote Richard Clayton - who studied the Cleanfeed system and concluded that it could be "reverse engineered" to provide a directory of illegal websitesFurthermore, a Cambridge professor of computing who has analysed the blocking system developed by BT, which claimed in 2004 to have been used to block thousands of attempted visits to banned sites, says it could be exploited by paedophiles to compile a list of the worst sites.
I have commented at length about censorware and pointed out that blacklist censorship of this kind does not prevent children being abused, that perverts are more likely to use P2P than the web, that the system had been found to be easily reverse engineered.and also expressed the opionion that LINX should be more concerned the with burden that implementing Cleanfeed will place on their members.
Now that the Guardian has expressed similar - although slightly more moderate - opinions, maybe public opionion will be roused to protect freedom of speech - but I doubt it.
For anyone who can't figure out why I am against censorware such as Cleanfeed being applied like a cyber-security blanket across the net - here are the reasons yet again.
1. It doesn't stop children being abused.I have also opined that :2. It doesn't stop perverts looking at illegal material.
3. It can be reverse engineered to provide a directory of illegal material.
4. It is expensive to implement - and doesn't work anyway.
5. It use a "secret" blacklist which is not open to inspection by ordinary people - but see (3) above.
6. There is no transparency in the "blacklists"- which could be manipulated for commercial or political gain.
7. Secret "blacklists" have no place in any "open" democratic country. - there must be checks and balance to monitor them - and currently there are none.
the government should tackle the root causes of illegal material on the Internet by attacking the criminal gangs who are linked to human trafficking for sexual activity, child pornography, and pornography spamrather than placing the problem "out of sight and out of mind" by using internet filtering rather than tackling the real root causes of child abuse.
For some reason the government are hell bent on imposing censorware that doesn't work in stopping child abuse, but which guarantees censorship of everything you hear, see and read on the web.
What is the real agenda here? Enquiring minds want to know ....
Tags: cleanfeed, censorship, censorware, internet filtering, child pornography, transnational crimes, the guardian, richard clayton