UK seeks automatic blocks on online porn

[Matter-Eater Lad]

LONDON (AP) — Internet service providers in Britain will be asked to automatically block access to pornography sites unless customers opt in, Prime Minister David Cameron announced Monday.

 

Cameron announced the move as part of measures to stop extreme sexual images he said were ‘‘corroding childhood.’’ Critics, however, said the measures were at best hard to implement and at worst a form of censorship.

 

In a speech to a children’s charity, Cameron said that ‘‘family-friendly’’ filters would become the default setting for new customers by the end of the year, and only account-holders would be able to change them.

 

He also announced a proposal to make it a crime to possess violent pornography containing simulated rape scenes, and said Google and other search engines would be asked to block searches based on certain phrases.

 

Anti-pornography activists welcomed the announcement,

 

‘‘This isn’t about censorship or restricting freedom, it’s simply about protecting children whilst allowing adults to do as they choose within the law,’’ said Peter Wanless, chief executive officer of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.

 

Cameron said it was not entirely clear how the measures would work, but service providers should be able to come up with solutions.

 

‘‘If there are technical obstacles to acting on this, don’t just stand by and say nothing can be done; use your great brains to overcome them,’’ he said.

 

‘‘You’re the people who have worked out how to map almost every inch of the earth from space, who have algorithms that make sense of vast quantities of information. You’re the people who take pride in doing what they say can’t be done.’’

 

But Padraig Reidy of free-speech group Index on Censorship said the proposals amounted to ‘‘a kind of default censorship.’’

 

‘‘If a filter is set up as a default then it can really restrict what people can see legitimately,’’ he told BBC radio. ‘‘Sites about sexual health, about sexuality and so on, will get caught up in the same filters as pornography. It will really restrict people’s experience on the web, including children's.’’

 

Columnist Nick Cohen, of the Spectator magazine, said recent disclosures about government snooping should make people wary of giving companies and authorities personal information — such as a desire to view pornography.

 

‘‘The expansion of legislation prohibiting pornographic images may sound equally reasonable until you remember it gives more powers to police and prosecutors,’’ he wrote. ‘‘The record shows they cannot be trusted to use them justly.’’

 

© Copyright 2013 Globe Newspaper Company.

 

http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/2013/07/22/says-will-ask-providers-block-online-porn/pyp9wMAkTVSG45CX69RlNK/story.html

[Prince Myshkin]

Fucked up. Surely can't happen.

[busybeeburns]

Another knee-jerk reaction from Cameron and his cronies

[Black Rose]

Won't work, look how well the ban on pirate bay has gone.

 

And 2 more sites are in the news for being banned, free promotion for them

[Prince Myshkin]

Indeed.

 

Hilarious seeing Daily Mail trumpeting it, next to their side bar of shame:

https://twitter.com/jackman365/status/359282317572841473/photo/1

 

Do they realise they are becoming a parody of themselves?

[Reilly]

Cameron's seemed like he just got bored one day and wanted to pick on the internet, I don't really know where this became of such importance but there's always been a clambering of attempts to connect it with different reasons, sometimes it's to stop pedophiles developing their thoughts (They didn't exist before the internet) and other times its to stop children seeing filth, there has never been a clear objective for this.

[Destrokk]

finally we can stop porn :)

[Cobalt]

united kingdom: no fun allowed

[Prince Myshkin]

If you opt in can you see the child porn?

[Black Rose]

Dear coldplaying.com, we, a unaccountable mysterious body, have decided that your website is porn.

This decision is final, There is no right to appeal against this decision

 

Kind Regards

 

Mysterious person in an unaccountable monster

[Reilly]

^We did recently have a thread about pornography, including a link to an external site which is a porn blog but has recently been adapted so it no longer contains or links to pornographic content (It used to have an 18+ warning to enter the site but now seems to play by the rules enough that it doesn't need the warning), but no doubt that will be seen as porn.

 

But with regards to Coldplaying, who knows what will be deemed porn, they might deem some of the gross discussion in those fangirl topics as "Adult content".

[Batman]

lol pr0n

 

But with regards to Coldplaying, who knows what will be deemed porn, they might deem some of the gross discussion in those fangirl topics as "Adult content".

Or the fanfic thread :charming:

[Prince Myshkin]

^We did recently have a thread about pornography, including a link to an external site which is a porn blog but has recently been adapted so it no longer contains or links to pornographic content (It used to have an 18+ warning to enter the site but now seems to play by the rules enough that it doesn't need the warning), but no doubt that will be seen as porn.

 

But with regards to Coldplaying, who knows what will be deemed porn, they might deem some of the gross discussion in those fangirl topics as "Adult content".

 

I got this board banned in China a few years back :cool:

 

I wonder if it still is...

[Reilly]

It's still banned you dingus.

[Matter-Eater Lad]

?

[Coeurli]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUifLbLVXFo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUifLbLVXFo[/ame]

[Prince Myshkin]

?

 

http://www.coldplaying.com/forum/showthread.php?t=76178&highlight=china

 

From post ten onwards.

[Guest LiquidSky]

finally we can stop porn :)

 

This made me laugh lol

[Coldplayfan1294]

You know what I started to think about? I am not even English, but it's hilarious to see Cameron use the indecency of child porn to assume a ban on ALL porn on the internet, not just that. Text-book example of using propaganda to enable wide-spread control. Figures.

 

So if they're going to filter porn websites and searches, why not filter out fifty-shades of grey from book stores and all other erotic novels? They're just as bad, right?

 

What a bunch of nonsense.

[Drippy]

Let's be honest, even David Cameron has looked porn at some point! It's used by literally 100% of men

 

Such an arsehole

[Reilly]

You know what I started to think about? I am not even English, but it's hilarious to see Cameron use the indecency of child porn to assume a ban on ALL porn on the internet, not just that. Text-book example of using propaganda to enable wide-spread control. Figures.

 

So if they're going to filter porn websites and searches, why not filter out fifty-shades of grey from book stores and all other erotic novels? They're just as bad, right?

 

What a bunch of nonsense.

 

Well that's exactly what's wrong with it, they start to deem what's indecent on such a mass-scale, and that's a good example among unlimited examples of problems that would arise from doing this (Which is why it'll never happen).

[Cobalt]

Let's be honest, even David Cameron has looked porn at some point! It's used by literally 100% of men

 

nah m8

[Prince Myshkin]

It isn't 100%, I'm 100% sure.

 

High percentage though.

I'd safely say above 70% (if we're talking between 21 and 30 - technology is relatively new to access it so easily, and sometimes people don't watch when they are younger), possibly quite a way more.

[Reilly]

I don't think wank material is the main agenda here, of course that's part of it, people (Or politicians) feel they can't oppose it because it looks like "oh YOU would want to keep porn available you filthy pervert! Shame!".

 

Very clever.

[Prince Myshkin]

Paralysing. You don't wanna be lax on child abuse and you don't wanna be a perv.