Porn filtering in the UK

21 Dec 10 | Uncategorized

Jillian C York is worried about proposed web filtering in the UK, and she thinks you should be too.

Personally, I’m fairly agnostic about pornography. I certainly wouldn’t miss it, and if I did, I know plenty of ways to get around Internet filters (which is another point: if you block porn, are you going to block circumvention tools too?). So for me, this isn’t about pornography, but rather, about the systems in place to block it. I don’t trust them. Nor do I have any reason to.

York compares the current guardians of the web in the UK, the Internet Watch Foundation, to America’s MPAA, which handles film classification:

The MPAA is a perfect comparison to the IWF: two nongovernmental bodies comprised of regular (often untrained, often uneducated) people making decisions for the rest of us. You should be very uncomfortable with this, whether you care about porn or not.

There is a fundamental issue of what constitutes “pornography”. UK law currently operates on a “know it when I see it” basis: which is probably about right: after all, people get their kicks in various, and varyingly odd, ways.

You can and should read the rest of the article here

Iranian web designer sentenced to death

09 Dec 10 | Digital Freedom, Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost

Iranian authorities have sentenced a web designer to death for allegedly creating a pornographic website. Canadian resident Saeed Malekpour, 35, was convicted of “designing and moderating adult content websites,” “agitation against the regime” in Tehran, and “insulting the sanctity of Islam”. Malekpour was detained in Iran in 2008 when he returned to visit his father.

China: 60,000 porn sites closed in crackdown

24 Nov 10 | Index Index, minipost, News and features

Sixty thousand websites deemed to host pornographic content have been shut down by the government since December 2009. The National Office Against Pornographic and Illegal Publications also said some 1.6 million websites had been checked. The office revealed many of the offending websites were discovered through informants. Five hundred and sixteen informers have been rewarded with USD 79,000 since the crackdown started.

Indonesia: Playboy editor jailed for “indecency”

11 Oct 10 | Index Index, minipost, News and features

The former editor-in-chief of Playboy Indonesia has begun a two-year prison sentence for publishing images of women in underwear. Erwin Arnada was found guilty of violating indecency laws during a closed trial at the Supreme Court in August, overturning the acquittal decided by South Jakarta District Council in 2007. Islamic hardliners launched legal action against Arnada in 2006, attacking Playboy Indonesia offices shortly after the magazine’s launch. Spokesman for the Islamic Defenders Front, Soleh Mahmud, said that the case shows “pornography has no place in Indonesia”.