Slashdot Log In
UK Gov. Clueless About Own Internet Blacklist
Posted by
kdawson
on Wed Mar 18, 2009 03:56 AM
from the get-me-someone-with-a-clue dept.
from the get-me-someone-with-a-clue dept.
spge writes "Computer Shopper magazine has interviewed the UK Home Office about its relationship with the Internet Watch Foundation and discovered that the government doesn't actually know what the IWF does, although it still plans to force UK ISPs to subscribe to the IWF's blacklist. The main story makes for interesting reading, but the best bit is the full transcript of the interview. Short version: the IWF investigates suspected child porn websites and adds any it finds to a list that ISPs can use to block these sites; uk.gov wants ISPs to use this list; however, the IWF is not an official government organization, does not appear to have legal permission to view child pornography, and quite possibly is breaking the law by doing so."
Related Stories
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you value your children, don't go to live in Cambridge.
The whole premiss of the IWF is that looking at this stuff makes you into a child-molesting pervert. The offices of the IWF (according to their website) are in Cambridge. So Cambridge must be full of child-molesting perverts working for the IWF.
If I'm wrong and it is not, I'm sorry for the accusation. But in that case, the whole basis of what the IWF is doing is wrong, and so the organization is pointless and should be disbanded.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Wish I had mod points ...
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Informative)
The answer lies in the snappily titled "Memorandum of Understanding [cps.gov.uk] (PDF) Between Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) concerning Section 46 Sexual Offences Act 2003".
In short, anyone who is listed in advance by their employer, as an employee who performs IT security duties which may lead them to come into contact with child abuse images as part of their job, will not be prosecuted providing their contact with the images is kept to the minimum required to perform their duties.
For example, responding to a user who has received an unsolicited child abuse image and:
* Helping them delete it, or disconnecting their PC for subsequent investigation by the police is good, whereas
* Making a copy to use in their own investigation is bad (investigation of child abuse must be left to the police).
Obviously if you're in the UK, and you're in IT security, and you're likely to need to perform these kinds of duties, it is very important that you ensure your employer already has you listed as being so.
The consequence is that, since most employers don't want to have PCs sitting around switched off waiting for the police to investigate them, the vast majority of child abuse image evidence is deleted on sight (literally).
Parent
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, no, no! You've got it all wrong. Looking at CP images makes you a pervert if you are a bad person. It's quite all right if you are a good person. The IWF - like the government, of course - are good people, so there's no problem.
This is strictly analogous to the logic whereby terrorists who kill people are irredeemably wicked (and usually "mindless"), while governments who kill thousands of times as many people are good (although maybe a tad careless).
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
This whole thing is ridiculous. How does looking at images of naked children cause harm? Is nudity "bad"? Is God some kind of pervert because he made-us naked without feathers or fur? C'mon people! If I take my family to a nudist resort, and I post our family photo, and I going to get drug-off in the middle of night as a child porn provider? Is nudism no longer acceptable? Sounds like 1984.
"If God wanted us to be naked, we would have been born that way" -- Oscar Wilde.
The sick social attitudes towards nudity that you allude to are not prevalent in all parts of the world. For example, in Finland it is considered quite normal for a whole family to go skinny-dipping together or to go into the sauna together. BTW, towels are NOT worn in the sauna - that would be considered wierd.
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Funny)
Hey, I live in Cambridge and I'm not a child-molesting... damn. But seriously, we were going to paste pictures of Virgin Killer all over their building at the end of last year, but everyone had gone home :(
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
It was more the irony of the situation. It was just after the wikipedia/IWF Virgin Killer furore; and we thought that it was absurd that since owning the image in paper form (on the album) was legal, that they should block it online. Hence cover their building in a legal 'child-porn' image...
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:4, Informative)
This story has already played out in Belgium : a so called child pornography searcher did not have an exactly clean slate regarding child abuse.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Indeed. On a similar note, when people call for things to be censored or banned (as with the recent law criminalising possession of "extreme" images of adults), a common tactic is to wheel out the story of how traumatic it is for the poor liddle IWF employees and police officers who have to look at this material, as an argument for it to be banned.
So um, who asked them to look at it? It's one thing when we're talking about police officers investigating a traumatic crime (such as with child abuse), but here
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Informative)
The whole premiss of the IWF is that looking at this stuff makes you into a child-molesting pervert.
No, only people without clearance can be made into a a child-molesting pervert by viewing those thing.
If you read the interview, you'll see that the IWF does not have clearance to view child pornography.
Parent
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:4, Insightful)
Hi, I'm just wondering what the hell can be a "clearance to watch child pornography" and who the hell is able to get or deliver one to another???
Parent
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Funny)
Hi, I'm just wondering what the hell can be a "clearance to watch child pornography" and who the hell is able to get or deliver one to another???
Well, if they are handed out by a Governmental agency that works in the same manner as DMV you'll need to stand in line for three hours, deal with someone who hates her job even though she is making three times what she would in the private sector and then get sent to the back of another line because you chose the wrong one even though nobody bothered to post any signs ;)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Hi, I'm just wondering what the hell can be a "clearance to watch child pornography" and who the hell is able to get or deliver one to another???
Presumable if your part of a team investigating a child porn ring then you need clearance to assess if the material is indeed illegal, also to try and track the children so you can be sure they're not/no longer suffering from abuse.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And i assume an exception to the possession of CP laws as well. After all, anyone who holds the evidence chain also holds CP...
I wish some politician would see the idiocy of all this and not just the potential to garner a few more votes.
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, no. If you look at most laws governing Child Pornography, it has jack squat to do with the abuse of children and paying for images of abuse. Virtual CP is illegal and criminal in many countries. Staged CP (adults dressed up as underage teens and purported as such) is illegal as well in most countries. Even actual consensual "CP" is illegal (ok, borderline, but google Traci Lords to see what I mean). If the abuse of children was what is was all about, authorities would do something serious about Human Trafficking, which victimizes 100's to 1000's of underage females yearly.
Don't get me wrong, I have serious issues with Child Abuse, but the whole fight against CP is symbolic and based upon morality. It is not doing much for the actual victims. Most abused children probably never end up in online CP. They remain anonymous in some dark basement or illegal brothel. And how often do you hear someone about that?
Parent
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I downloaded Brooke Shields "Pretty Baby" from Pirate Bay, since no other organization would carry it. For those not familiar, this movie shows a naked girl at around age 13, just prior to the onset of puberty.
In which countries is ownership of this movie considered illegal? The UK? France? Germany?
Why?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
but the whole fight against CP is symbolic and based upon morality. It is not doing much for the actual victims.
I don't even think it is based upon morality, it's more about control and making it easier for the public to swallow legislation that restricts citizens' rights. The recipe is very simple: if you want to control people "offline", make them be afraid of bombs and use terrorism to scare them into submission. If you want to control them "online", use CP.
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Funny)
Especially from people who think about the children, alot.
Parent
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Funny)
They're going to be getting some interesting job applicants, aren't they?
I've already applied. It's what I do all day anyway. Well, that and /..
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:4, Insightful)
Are we talking about jobs at the IWF, or with the government?
Parent
Re:Who watches the watchers? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Can we change it to:-
UK Gov. Clueless
The first rule about blacklists is (Score:5, Funny)
New title required.... (Score:5, Informative)
You could just get away with:
"UK Gov. Clueless"
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
You could just get away with:
"UK Gov. Clueless"
As much as I love sticking it to the poms I don't think their government has the patent on cluelessness.
Re:New title required.... (Score:5, Funny)
Oh i think our Government does have that patent somewhere, remember we did own most of the world at one point,
so we must have spawned the cluelessness of other governments.
Parent
Re:New title required.... (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Or in other words... (Score:4, Insightful)
How do you report a crime without self-incriminating yourself since viewing said crime is a crime?
Re:Or in other words... (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Or in other words... (Score:4, Insightful)
"I believe that ACPO (the Association of Chief Police Officers) have written a memorandum of understanding (MoU) in which they state that IT technicians investigating the matter will not be prosecuted"
Well, at least until you start demonstrating how careless the police are being with the law, suggesting that evidence of a system downloading something is evidence of a person owning the system being the one using it at that time:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/09/17/ore_bates_arrest/ [theregister.co.uk]
Personally, whilst the idea of working for the police in the past has interested me when they've complained about a shortage of people skilled to do the job, I'd now keep well away. If they arrest you and try and label you a criminal when you're actually doing the right thing and trying to ensure justice is done then that's not somewhere I'd ever want to work. Effectively they're saying, look we wont arrest you for helping us find people loosely related to these crimes as long as you side with us against these people even if innocent.
As Slashdot likes it's car analogies, it's akin to a vehicle crash expert being arrested for pointing out the innocence of a guy who has been arrested for manslaughter because his car was stolen whilst he was at work and used to run someone over.
Parent
Re:Or in other words... (Score:4, Informative)
I was quite shocked recently to find out that ACPO is a private company.
http://www.acpo.police.uk/about.html [police.uk]: "The Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) is not a staff association ... The Association has the status of a private company limited by guarantee."
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
How do you report a crime without self-incriminating yourself since viewing said crime is a crime?
Use doublethink [wikipedia.org], which is a very British thing to do.
Re:Or in other words... (Score:5, Interesting)
A guy in my local had an indecent image of a child emailed to him from an address unknown to him. He didn't know what the email contained, and it was obscured with content which wouldn't identify it as being CP in any way (subject and body were innocuous). He called the local police station and a PC came down to check it out.
Apparently, the PC saw the picture, turned to the guy, and said (paraphrasing) "I'm going outside for a smoke. You're going to delete that email and the picture before I come back in, or I have to arrest you for viewing an indecent image of a minor. That's just how the law is written."
Moral of the story? If you're in the UK, don't report ANYTHING to the police. Ever.
Parent
Re:Or in other words... (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Or in other words... (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, that was simply dumb luck. Rule of thumb: NEVER go to government with bad OR good news, because if you do, you are putting yourself at risk. At the very least you are in for a hassle, and at the worst, you can probably guess. Let government come to you. Just don't deal with them until you absolutely have to.
On the most basic level, government's only interest in you, as a citizen, is (1) taking your money, and (2) determining if you are a criminal. To be clear, government is NOT interested in minding their own business, because their business is minding YOUR business.
Again, let government come to you, and your life will be easier.
Parent
Re:Or in other words... (Score:4, Interesting)
Check out the Protection of Children Act 1978 [opsi.gov.uk]. From the Wikipedia article [wikipedia.org] on the subject:
"In the United Kingdom, it is illegal to take, make, distribute, show or possess an indecent image of a child. Accessing an indecent image is considered to be "making" the image, meaning that a defendant can be charged under the Protection of Children Act if he accessed an image without saving it."
It is illegal to view the image. It's just how the law is written.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Sir or madam, people spam for _everything_. Read http://www.sophos.com/pressoffice/news/articles/2006/03/offspam.html [sophos.com]: while the article is a few years out of date, there's a commercial notification from a security company that it does occur.
Now, the policeman's behavior was one of making sure he didn't have to do any work and deal with the complaint, not one of actually dealing with the porn. That matches FBI behavior in the US, whose actual response to spam and fraud remains, basically, 'hit the D key', d
Well, it looks like... (Score:2)
The title should read... (Score:4, Informative)
"UK Gov. Representative Clueless About Own Internet Blacklist"
I'm well aware that the representative is meant to represent the views of the entire UK Home Office but I think in this case it appears he is most likely a PR man armed with some talking points. I don't think it's reasonable to expect a PR man to understand the finer points of internet censorship, or to respond to questions perfectly from what appears to be a much more technically able interviewer.
I do think it's reasonable to expect the policy makers and the people pushing this policy to understand how it works.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
It would have been the spokesman's responsibility to say "I am not in the know about this, let me check back with the relevant departments first".
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
No, here in the UK we like to appoint people without any technological clue into jobs where they're making technical decisions.
If the representative they send is likely to be representative of the people in charge: technologically incompetent.
Re:The title should read... (Score:4, Insightful)
If they're speaking in the name of the Home Office, then the title is spot on. Also, the transcript explicitly states that all questions were sent to the Home Office a full day before the interview "to give them plenty of time to prepare". If they can't even prepare properly, then not only is the Home Office clueless, but the PR man is useless at his job.
Regardless, what you said is exactly what's wrong with the UK government*: too many f*cking PR men with their dial set to constant spin-cycle. (Never mind too many unelected officials making decisions and influencing policy).
Who are these nameless idiots anyway? "A home office spokesman", doesn't (s)he have a name?
* Likely to continue under the Tories as well.
Parent
Plausible deniability (Score:5, Insightful)
is what it's about. If they don't know what the IWF is actually doing, then when it goes wrong, they can say "wasn't us". That is standard practice for the current UK government. Fred Goodwin's pension? We didn't know about that. UK residents being totured by the CIA? Wasn't us. 400 needless deaths in a hospital? We've given local health authorities responsibility for maintaining standards. Etc etc.
Re:Plausible deniability (Score:5, Insightful)
The way this works with the IWF is that they say "we don't censor anything: we just supply a list of web sites to ISPs; if the ISPs choose to censor what is on that list, that is up to them".
The government says "we don't censor anything; if the ISPs choose to get a list of web sites from the IWF and then block them, that is nothing to do with us".
And the ISPs say "it's not our fault: the IWF gives a list of web sites to block: we've got no control over that list, and if we didn't block them, the government would make a law forcing us to do so".
So nobody has any responsibility for anything that happens.
Parent
The trend is to "guess they do a good job"? (Score:4, Insightful)
Quite a large population "guesses that the government does an adequate job"... and anyway, it can't be changed.
The government "guesses that the advisors do a good job", and anyway, it can't all be checked, and we're better off with than without them.
I guess that my boss is doing a good job, but anyway, I cannot do his job, and I am clueless what he actually does all day.
I guess that the news agencies are telling the truth, but anyway, I can't go out to check it all myself.
And apparently, the UK government guesses that the IWF's blacklist is a good thing... and anyway, it's already there and its use can't be checked (easily by PM's themselves).
We're all guessing, and the system is easy to hijack. And we're all convinced that it cannot be changed, and therefore we're stuck.
I guess you all knew that already, didn't you?
Re:Nothing to worry about (Score:4, Informative)
Parent