Comments on: Censorship and the DIA filter

By: mark

mark — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 02:59:40 +0000

Cheaper than what? For the individual user, there is no dollar cost in the DIA scheme. Last I looked the prices for home based filter software range from $US25 – 60 so let’s say $40 average, which is ~$NZ60. So that’s per computer. So, 1,621,000 total households filtered by 75% which have internet connections (broadband and dial-up) at 1.5 machines per household (on the basis that no connected household will have less than one computer, but many will have more than 2) and you’re looking at $109,417,500 per annum, as these are subscription-based products. Compare that with $150K pa for the filter – doesn’t stack up by an order of magnitude.

But you say it “runs deeper” – please elucidate.

By: Oblex.B

Oblex.B — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 00:19:55 +0000

It would work out cheaper to buy your own software protection against illegal porn etc.
But we know it runs deeper than that…this scheme.

By: Links 2/3/2010: Linux-2.6.33-libre is Released | Boycott Novell

Links 2/3/2010: Linux-2.6.33-libre is Released | Boycott Novell — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 02:05:22 +0000

[...] Censorship and the DIA filter Officials at DIA have assured me that they do not want to extend the filter, even to cover the other parts of s3(2), or I would not have agreed to be a part of the process at all. As the ZDNet article says, they have watched the train wreck that is the Great Wall of Conroy (my words, not theirs) and are determined to not make those sorts of errors. [...]

By: mark

mark — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 21:28:25 +0000

I agree. As I said above, it’s security theatre. y aim is to try to minimise those possibilities. I can’t stop them filtering, but I can do my best to make sure it doesn’t extend beyond its remit.

By: Craig

Craig — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 13:34:53 +0000

What if a purveyor of inappropriate material set up a website that detects the IP address of the visitor and thereby shows the internet censorship department pictures of happy kittens, but shows everyone else pictures of nasty things?

(or is happy kittens during business hours and turns nasty between 10pm and 4am each day)

Or a website that only shows an approved list (of paying inappropriate material viewers) the inappropriate material – and everyone else sees happy kittens?

What if a company (through a third party) hacks a competitor, places bad pictures on their server and then, after an appropriate period, reports their website and gets it taken off-the-air?

What if an overseas syndicate hacks your server and uses it to store dodgy material (no security is perfect)?

What if the website address changes weekly – or daily – or hourly?

What if the government decides to add a category of material to the filter – for example X-rated pictures of small-breasted women – and then extends it further and further with amendments…..where might it stop?

There are simply too many ways to get around this type of filtering – and far too many ways to spoof, hack or use it beyond its intention it for it to be worth the money.

Thin edge of the wedge.

By: mark

mark — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 01:15:56 +0000

Yep, that’s the reason I think the filter won’t work.
As I understand it, notifying DIA won’t put you on a list, but there’s no point in notifying anything that isn’t a web page.
Your son and niece seem pretty balanced about it, and I think most kids would be. It’s the parents who freak out about it.

By: Sceptic

Sceptic — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 00:46:23 +0000

Yes, well I’m sure that the CIA filter would have stopped the prominent doctor in Palmy North from downloading his little collection of inappropriate images. Not !
Quite farcical in that this goon got caught and was slapped with a wet bus ticket.
So, who really is “protecting the children” ?

Twice, my internet connection has accessed CP, but it was NOT thru web browsing – both times they were bundled up in well-seeded torrent or e-mule archives – usually rar formats. Miley Cyrus’ Greatest Hits or similar in one case, and another was in a bundle of album artwork for an artist. Both my niece and my son didn’t seem too fazed by it – “happens all the time”, quite common it seems amongst their school friends.

Now this presents a catch-22 – do you report it and risk being on a “notified list”, and perhaps have your computer gear uplifted for weeks at a time for “forensic analysis” ? Or does one just purge the files and annotate the torrents ? If you annotate the torrents as CP, then you are advertising that the torrent is CP for those that are expressly looking ?

By: mark

mark — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 06:19:12 +0000

You may have misunderstood my position, Mr Anonymous. I’m involved because I don’t agree with the filter. My tax money too, BTW.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 03:34:29 +0000

i don’t think the list of people thought about this filter enough, YOUR WASTING OUT TAX MONEY GET OUT OF THE COUNTRY

By: mark

mark — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 23:31:37 +0000

Thanks, Raoul. Not feeling particularly uber, but I’ll do what I can.

People need to approach their MPs and raise a stir as to why NZ is doing this. Sadly, I suspect the predominant response will be “we’re protecting our kids” and who wouldn’t want to to that?