
Sleepwalking into censorship - sdoering
https://www.openrightsgroup.org/blog/2013/sleepwalking-into-censorship
======
leke
> "web forums" and "esoteric material"

Well there you go. Very unspecified. You can kiss "the free internet" goodbye.

This site might even be under threat. It does have the word hacker in its
title. Then there are hacking forums related to breaking into systems. Even
though we use them for learning about securing systems, I see the government
disagreeing.

~~~
kybernetyk
Aren't reddit and HN web forums?

~~~
InclinedPlane
Aren't flickr, tumblr, twitter, youtube, and facebook also web forums?

~~~
aegiso
Totally, but nobody believes these will be blocked by default.

That's how censorship works. It's arbitrary and at the whims of those in
power.

~~~
ballard
Qui tacet consentire videtur.

Silence gives consent.

This demands vigilant civil disobedience in the strongest terms possible. Make
camp in Victoria and let Cameron know that this is not okay.

------
edent
Don't just moan about it online - put your money where your mouth is. If
you're in the UK, join the OpenRightsGroup
[https://www.openrightsgroup.org/join/](https://www.openrightsgroup.org/join/)

~~~
northwest
And as a short term solution (assuming VPNs will also be outlawed or otherwise
made unattractive), take your pick:

[http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-
anonymit...](http://torrentfreak.com/vpn-services-that-take-your-anonymity-
seriously-2013-edition-130302/)

My personal favorite is [https://mullvad.net/en/](https://mullvad.net/en/)
because:

a) not US based, therefor not subject to US laws (both known and secret
laws/courts)

b) you can send them cash as your payment method (every online payment method
such as Paypal, credit card, etc. will establish a link back to you)

c) they don't keep logs

c) you can easily set up multiple "exit" countries (good for circumventing
geoblocking)

~~~
vbuterin
> send them cash

Or Bitcoin, for that matter.

~~~
drakeandrews
Except bitcoin establishes a public, permanent and irrefutable link between
yourself (or at least information that, except in specific circumstances, can
be linked back to yourself) and the provider.

~~~
vbuterin
That's easy to avoid - just send the money through a mixer like this one
[https://blockchain.info/wallet/send-
shared](https://blockchain.info/wallet/send-shared) . Or any Bitcoin exchange
or gambling site. Or a combination of three or four. Or you can just buy the
bitcoins in person.

------
binarymax
_[X] Extremist and terrorist related content_

That to me looks like a big red flag to classify you as a terrorist if you
uncheck the box, if they decide later they don't like you for some other
reason.

~~~
rmc
Don't worry! The UK Government _never_ misuses terrorism laws or brings in
heavy handed anti-terrorism laws! Just ask all the people in Northern Ireland!

~~~
dictum
And Jean Charles de Menezes.

~~~
rmc
Best not to look a bit foreign when it comes to anti-terrorism stuff in the
UK.

------
nly
Above and beyond the obvious moral debate over whether or not a filtering
option _should_ be offered, whether it can be effective, or whether it should
be opt-in or opt-out, a number of practical things worry me about having _any_
such architecture in place:

1\. Once you classify web activity it becomes more economical, and arguably
even justified in order to carry the cost of maintaining the filter, to make
the move to offering a tiered internet service (i.e. having to pay more for
access to porn)

2\. Not everyone in a household may have the same preferences, so you'll
inevitably want to to start tracking web activity on a _per-person_ basis

3\. Your preferences will be kept by your ISP, probably their partners, and
definitely made available to authorities on-demand. "The defendant opted-in to
viewing violent pornography Your Honour".

4\. To simplify the design the system will most likely require that all 'hits'
in any given category be routed to a web proxy system, even while you're
opted-out. You can bet that this will be logged meticulously by someone. Hell,
some ISPs may even be brazen enough to offer the 'feature' of alerting parents
to their kids activities. So it's potentially, "The defendant opted-in to
viewing violent pornography Your Honour, and did so on a regular basis."

5\. Massive potential impact to the robustness and performance of the web.
More middle-boxes. Less flexibility to replace protocols, even HTTP 2.0, in
the future.

------
cnidoblast
I'm lucky I live in China. Here I can open any website i want, including adult
content, just need 1 second to turn on the SSH, It has been working amazingly
for 7 years, since i came to China. It's funny when i go to Hong Kong, and i
see the signs warning you about the high fines you will pay if you throw a bit
of bread to a bird, or if you smoke while walking on the street. Then when i
tell HK people that I live in China and I love it and they say "but is not
free there!" I just smile and say "yeah". In Europe you can't even buy a
bottle of beer and walk away from the shop at night, If you take off your
shirt in a hot day and walk outside people look at you like you are a
criminal, while in China it is just normal. There are different kinds of
freedom, off course, but the daily-life freedom we enjoy in China is better
imho than the European daily-life's "strictly controlled freedom"

~~~
biafra
"In Europe you can't even buy a bottle of beer and walk away from the shop at
night"

You are wrong on this.

In which european country is that a problem? Certainly not in Germany. Please
be more specific.

~~~
VMG
Well, I'm in Germany and can't buy beer after 10pm.

[http://www.welt.de/vermischtes/article6609694/In-Baden-
Wuert...](http://www.welt.de/vermischtes/article6609694/In-Baden-Wuerttemberg-
gilt-nachts-Alkoholverbot.html)

~~~
biafra
1\. This new law only applies to Baden-Wuertemberg (not Europe or Germany) 2\.
You can still buy beer at that time in restaurants

~~~
VMG
Yeah but still.

------
coopdog
"There comes a point that it is simply better to place your sales through
Amazon and ebay, and circulate your news and promotions exclusively through
Facebook and Twitter, as you know none of these will ever be filtered."

Even this is a dangerous opinion. The worst kind of censorship is self-
censorship, where just the threat of being filtered causes organisations to
self-filter far more than the government has ever asked for, because the
boundaries of what is acceptable have never been defined.

You can say "they'd never block facebook", but just the threat of a government
mandated social network is enough to get facebook to do what they want.

------
ajuc
Do what people did when ACTA was about to be signed - protest on the streets.
A few tousand people on the streets of most big cities in a country speak to
politicians louder than online petition signed by 1 000 000 people.

Polish politicians have learnt their lesson last year and now they know to not
even try: [http://rys.io/en/109](http://rys.io/en/109)

~~~
nodata
Why is there always this focus on protesting on streets? It's a serious
question. People clearly don't like doing that. Is it old fashioned?

Why does my protest only count when I am on a street, and how can I make non-
street based protests count more?

Clicking Like buttons is lazy and meaningless. What's the middle ground?

~~~
ajuc
I think that by going to a street protest you show you care enough to spend
significant amount of time, so you probably also care enough to go vote
against that politician in next elections.

Clicking online poll is just too convenient to mean anything.

------
beedogs
Of course it will, because filtering porn was never really the intention in
the first place.

~~~
ionwake
wait what? Im confused, thanks.

~~~
nitrogen
My guess is the headline used to be a question. Either that, or the parent
accidentally clicked the wrong reply link, or (unlikely) the comment got
assigned to the wrong parent by the HN software.

------
spindritf
So if you press "no" on the first screen during setup, you will be not
affected by filtering? Somehow, I cannot see the great danger to freedom in
that.

Actually, as far as free speech in Britain goes[1][2][3][4][5], that almost
sounds like a courtesy.

[1]
[http://www.worldmag.com/2013/07/american_street_preacher_arr...](http://www.worldmag.com/2013/07/american_street_preacher_arrested_in_london_for_hate_speech)

[2] [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2330180/Woolwich-
att...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2330180/Woolwich-attacks-Man-
charged-making-racist-anti-religious-Facebook-comments-British-soldier-s-
death.html)

[3] [http://rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/27/free-
speech-o...](http://rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/27/free-speech-or-
hate-speech-britain-bans-u-s-anti-muslim-bloggers/?_r=0)

[4]
[http://www.christian.org.uk/rel_liberties/cases/harry_hammon...](http://www.christian.org.uk/rel_liberties/cases/harry_hammond.htm)

[5] [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-
london-23128956](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23128956)

~~~
jvdh
You will be on a list of people who have actively opted out of pornography
censorship. Imagine what would happen to your reputation if that list got
leaked.

You would be forced into a situation where you would have to explain why you
want to receive pornography. While you and I can probably see the fine points
of this debate, the general public generally would not.

~~~
IanCal
That one doesn't bother me as much as one of the other standard tick boxes on
TalkTalks filter, "extremist websites".

Who wants to be on a list of people who have actively said "I want to access
extremist websites"?

In fact, why should that even be an option? For the childrens sake, why would
we let _anybody_ on those sites? Wouldn't it be better to simply block those
sites completely? I mean, we've got the tech place, lists of websites, lets
just assume it's ticked for everyone and not display it...

~~~
eCa
Who decides exactly what is "extremist related"?

If a news agency shows the latest Al-Qaeda video, isn't that spreading
terrorist ideologies?

But the entire thing is just wrong: If we (the "western" world) does
something; how can we criticize oppresive regimes when they do the same thing?

What can we say when Egypt blocks internet access for "national security".
What to say about North Korea and their near total censorship to protect the
NK culture (and possibly saving their children's innocence).

------
chmike
Some people are afraid that the revolution that took place in north Africa
could happen in their country too. It's time to get ready for resistance and
underground uncensored information transmission. The 1% starts to fear they
may lose control of their domination.

Anyway Cameron has it all wrong, terrorists don't look at porn.

~~~
devonbarrett
haven't you seen all the terrorists on the forum howtomakeabomb.com; clearly
we need to censor web forums to stop this!

~~~
chmike
Censoring will stop what ? This is just an attempt to restore obscurantism. If
education doesn't work then consider the possibility that that something might
be wrong with your assumptions.

------
josscrowcroft
Horrific. About 80% of what I read would be classed as "esoteric" and the rest
probably blocked for some other reason I didn't foresee being included in that
list.

------
jrockway
So is the EU OK with the UK blocking all web forums by default? Any
statements, court challenges, etc. yet?

~~~
kmfrk
Let's see if the UK are even members of the EU in two years. :/

One hopes the trade deal with the US can reel them back in.

I don't think the EU necessarily have the best record on Internet freedom,
even though I see many great things about the union.

~~~
rmc
_Let 's see if the UK are even members of the EU in two years. :/_

I can just see the no-to-eu/anti-unionist referendum leaflets now: "The EU is
forcing your kids to look at porn! We want to block it, but Brussles says no!"

------
MarcScott
My main concern is with regards to who has control of the blacklist. I can
imagine site like [http://torrentfreak.com](http://torrentfreak.com) being
blocked from the onset, even though it is nothing more than a news aggregation
site. How big a jump is it to then block sites like
[http://www.pirateparty.org.uk](http://www.pirateparty.org.uk) or maybe even
[http://www.openrightsgroup.org](http://www.openrightsgroup.org) itself.

------
marincounty
I used to think I wouldn't want my kids seeing things on the Internet. I'm
beginning to think, let them see it all, in all it's ugly glory. They just
might rethink living a moral life?

------
seanlinmt
For those wanting to read more about dark patterns in design..
[http://darkpatterns.org/](http://darkpatterns.org/)

------
Vindexus
Was this post not linked to Wired just a few minutes ago?

~~~
keeran
I assume a mod realised the Wired article was just a lazy rehash of this
source.

------
tmerr
I wonder how much of this is guesswork on the part of Open Rights Group. I'm
concerned about censorship but I also want to keep my facts straight.

------
ToothlessJake
Five Eyes is run by a self interested profit motivated pool of persons who
trade insider info such as exploits to use against others.[1] Their treasonous
reach is spreading and thankfully people are becoming aware.

People who dare collate information on the persons behind companies like
Endgame and Booz Allen have federal resources put upon them. The site[1]
linked, started in part by Barrett Brown is part of this battle.[2]

SOS.

[1]
[http://wiki.echelon2.org/wiki/Endgame_Systems](http://wiki.echelon2.org/wiki/Endgame_Systems)

[2] [http://www.thenation.com/article/174851/strange-case-
barrett...](http://www.thenation.com/article/174851/strange-case-barrett-
brown)

