Nat'l Law Journal and The Independent on CWD and net-filters

[declan@well.com (Declan McCullagh)]

Date: Tue, 30 Jul 1996 16:04:48 -0500
To: fight-censorship-announce@vorlon.mit.edu
From: declan@well.com (Declan McCullagh)
Subject: FC: Nat'l Law Journal and The Independent on CWD and net-filters
Sender: owner-fight-censorship-announce@vorlon.mit.edu

Attached are portions of two articles from the National Law Journal and
London's The Independent following up on the CyberWire Dispatch that Brock
and I put out earlier this month on the rather unusual behavior of
net-filtering software.

The original CWD is at:
  http://www.eff.org/pub/Publications/Declan_McCullagh/
  http://cyberwerks.com:70/cyberwire/cwd/ (eventually)

-Declan

===========================================================================

The National Law Journal
Monday, August 5, 1996
Page A13
By Ann Davis

...Civil libertarians are demanding to know: since when were the National
Organizaton for Women or the Endangered Species Coalition in the same class
as devil worshippers? How can photos posted by animal rights groups be
categorized as "gross depictions"? Caught in a dragnet of blocking software
are web sites on everything from the safe use of fireworks to safe sex,
according to a report by the Internet-based news service CyberWire
Dispatch.

To blocked groups' disappointment, however, Internet legal experts say any
lawsuit against private computer censors may be a losing proposition...
[Mike Godwin is quoted.]

...A cyber-Deep Throat recently leaked the lists to two Internet
investigative reporters, Brock N. Meeks and Declan B. McCullagh.
Blacklisted sites include a Silicon Valley council of the National Rifle
Association and Cyber High School, whose web address is similar to that of
a gay video site... [Snapshot of CyberHigh's web page included]

As a lawyer for CompuServe, Inc., Mr. Cunard meets potential legal
challenges with skepticism. The free speech angle? Implausible against a
private entity, he said. Discrimination claims? Difficult, unless you can
prove the Internet is a place of public accomodation. Tortious
interferrence? not likely, because most web site operators don't require
subscriptions and therefore don't have a duty to those who access their
sites.

===========================================================================

The Independent (London)
Monday, July 22, 1996
By Charles Arthur

REAL ALE IS TOO STRONG FOR THE AMERICAN MORALISTS

Programs to protect children from Net porn are keeping them out of
a vast range of sites, says Charles Arthur

[...]
        Since last July, programs such as Cyber Patrol, NetNanny and
Cybersitter have sold thousands of copies. Some have distribution
agreements with organisations such as BT and CompuServe. The makers boast
that their products "includes a bad site list of thousands of Wed sites
that are not suitable for children" and "allow parents to censor what their
children access on the Internet."
        So far, so good - except that many of those "banned" sites include
many British sources holding very useful or entirely innocent information.
And the morality underlying many of the bannings is very American, and
quite unlike that which a British parent might be expected to apply.
        Among the British sites on the World Wide Web which your child
would be unable to access when using the programs are the Campaign for Real
Ale (Camra), the Prison Lexicon (which provides information about penal
reform), the computing department of Queen Mary and Westfield College,
Imperial College, the University of Stirling, the Internet connection
companies Demon and Zetnet, and Telephone Information Services - which
offers weather and share reports but not sex lines.
        Between them, the programs prevent access to tens of thousands of
sites on the Internet. But they effectively apply an American system of
morals - on religion, weapons, drugs, alcohol and sex - to the data which
British children might be expected to know about, or could obtain from
newspapers.
        None of the operators of any of the sites mentioned above was aware
that they were "blocked", and all were mystified by it.  "Which
self-selected Mary Whitehouse put us on their list?" asked Iain Lowe,
research manager of Camra.
        In Camra's case, the answer is a team of researchers at
Microsystems Software, based in Farmingham, Massachusetts, which has been
selling Cyber Patrol since July 1995, and now claims 80 per cent of a
fast-growing market. "Camra's site is blocked under our code for beer,
alcohol, wine and tobacco," said Dick Gorgens, the company's chief
executive. "It was added on June 10 when it was advertising a beer
festival."
        Mr Lowe responded, "We don't promote underage drinking. But pubs in
this country are allowed to apply for childrens' certificates: all the
family can go. And we have had inquiries to our site from GCSE students
doing projects on the economics of the brewing industry."
        Mr Gorgens denied that the program was imposing American morals
onto British users. However, the panel which reviews the banning of sites
includes no Britons, although it does include representatives from the
National Rifle Association and the right-wing anti-pornography Morality in
Media group.

[...]

        "A close look at the actual range of sites blocked by these
programs shows they go far beyond just restricting 'pornography'," said
Brock Meeks, an Internet journalist and consultant who, with fellow
journalist Declan McCullough, obtained a decoded list of the sites banned
by the programs earlier this month, July, and revealed their
indiscriminate breadth in an Internet mailing list, Cyberwire Dispatch.
        Steve Robinson-Grindey, who runs the Prison Lexicon site, said "It
is effectively an electronic encyclopaedia of everything concerning prisons
and penal affairs in England and Wales. It is extensively used by schools
and universities for information. Even the People's Republic of China allow
access to the site." He thought it might be banned because "obviously they
rely on search words for filtering - in which case they would discover the
words sex, AIDS, homosexual, and so on. But they failed to realise these
words were being used in serious material."

[...]


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