Re: Blacklist project proposal (was Re: Banner ad blocker? Anyone with a good blocklist...)

willy@snowyowl.csu.ac.ru wrote:
>
> Good $daytime,
>
> > Date: Sat, 14 Mar 1998 21:45:28 +1000
> > From: Dancer <dancer@brisnet.org.au>
> > To: willy@snowyowl.csu.ac.ru
> > Cc: squid-users@nlanr.net
> > Subject: Re: Blacklist project proposal (was Re: Banner ad blocker? Anyone with a good blocklist...)
>
> > ISP hat:
>
> ISP hat on.
>
> > The trouble is, of course, if you make _any_ effort to filter content,
> > you become legally liable as if you were the _supplier_ of any of it
> > that slips through. Think very hard about that. That law passed in the
> > USA two years ago, and in Australia last year. Maybe in other countries
> > as well, now.
>
> 1. What about _optional_ service for customers? There are people
> who do not want to pay for ads/endless kid's chats/porno. Customer
> will get it blocked by his own decision. Such practise is widely
> known in email spam filtering.

Filtering at the receiver's request is cool. They want it? They get it.

> 2. As I'm in Russia right now, I can read amends to US Constitution as
> science fiction, at least in foreseeable future -- no offense all
> US people :)

Heh. The USA is _really_ another planet. Trust me on this. I've heard
stories :)

> 3. Our ISP is academic research network (see http://www.free.net/).
> FREEnet policy explicitly defines inacceptable activities. Lacking
> bandwidth, we should be able to not only _declare_ but _enforce_
> such policy, shouldn't we?

I think you are in rather a different position to me, ISP-hat-wise.

> > My Employee hat:
>
> ISP hat off.
>
> 1. One's corporate network may have Internet usage policy in accordance
> with company goals. As such policy is applicable to employees
> only, it doesn't involve any freedom of speech issues. Am I wrong?

Correct. Although 'freedom of speech' isn't actually the basic issue in
the legalities. The legalese revolves around 'supply of illicit or
illegal material (possibly to minors or those that might be offended)'.

I've been listening with reluctant interest on a couple of cases, where
the _user_ had downloaded (or otherwise electronically recieved)
pornographic or objectionable materials, and subsequently successfully
sued the provider. One was in the USA, the other in Sweden. Precedents
like that worry me. From both cases, I suspect that the court-case was
born out of mock-indignation to disguise being 'caught-in-the-act'.

All in all, it's one of those bag of worms things. Mind you, I block
advertising banners for all I'm worth, and anything that the customer
wants me to block.

> > In _this_ capacity, I'm stuck needing to do the best, most adaptive
> > filtering job that I can. I can _make_ software...what I need are
> > _techniques_ and _lists_..
>
> Regards,
> Willy.
>
> --
> "No easy hope or lies | Vitaly "Willy the Pooh" Fedrushkov
> Shall bring us to our goal, | Information Technology Division
> But iron sacrifice | Chelyabinsk State University
> Of Body, Will and Soul." | mailto:willy@csu.ac.ru +7 3512 156770
> R.Kipling | http://www.csu.ac.ru/~willy VVF1-RIPE

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