Lawmakers Want to Block Pornography at the Expense of Free Speech and Privacy

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/02/state-lawmakers-want-block-pornography-expense-your-free-speech-privacy-and-hard

by pdcerb • 8 years ago

154 57 8 years ago

limeblack• 8 years ago

Laws like this reminds me how little many people understand technology. There is no realistic way to my knowledge to implement this on all devices when torrents and open source operating systems exist. The article even agrees with me at some levels "The technical requirements for this kind of aggressive platform censorship at scale are simply unworkable."

4ad2• 8 years ago

On the contrary, now with locked smartphones and tablets this is very easy to implement. Of course it would be trivially defeatable, but that is never the point. The vast majority of people would not know how to defeat it. The law is not concerned with edge cases, it's concerned with bulk surveillance.

Just like the laws against cryptography. Lawmakers are not stupid, they know they can't stop bad actors from using crypto. They don't care about bad actors, they care about you and me.

mirimir2• 8 years ago

Well, sure there are "bad actors". But some of us like to work around that bullshit just for fun, and to share :) And indeed, many of those "bad actors" are actually pretty clueless.

nickpeterson• 8 years ago

Apple could basically choose to ignore this law if it passed and these state governments would reveal they have no actual power in the globalized world. Oops

4ad2• 8 years ago

Why would Apple do such a thing? Presumably there would be fines if they didn't comply. If everybody is doing it (which is just Google and Apple, really), nobody gains or loses and advantage, so why would they care?

ball_of_lint2• 8 years ago

Apple has a large part of their reputation built on security and privacy, neither of which is at all possible with arbitrary government censorship software baked into every device.

gremlinsinc• 8 years ago

Apple could take a gamble and cease operations in states that require the changes, thus pissing off constituents and making them back pedal and change the laws.

A lot of Apple users aren't too bright (1000+ Mac Mail TS issues while serving a stint at a major shitty hosting firm owned by EIG), and would be lost without their apple devices.

Device manufacturers could instead sue on grounds that it's not their responsibility that the local govt will need to come up with their OWN apps and force consumers to install them, or local telecoms. There will be lots of court battles for sure...

saagarjha• 8 years ago

Those filters could only be removed if consumers pay a $20 fee.

Wait, what? Why should a fee to opt out exist?

brianwawok• 8 years ago

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

dang• 8 years ago

Not here, please.

xorxarle3• 8 years ago

I'll charge my friends <$20 to install a custom rom/firmware. More $$$$$ for me.

Crontab• 8 years ago

That almost makes me wonder if this is being pushed by someone with a financial interest in the outcome.

rgbrenner• 8 years ago

Read their faq... this question and the one after it: http://humantraffickingpreventionact.com/#q2

They encourage retailers and manufacturers to charge more than the $20 and pocket the difference. They are marketing the bill as pro-business.

aspett• 8 years ago

This is mindblowing. "I can't believe" is so watered down it can not express the feeling felt when reading things like this. This past year has been insanity - this is just insanity..

deathanatos• 8 years ago

The writing and grammar on that site is terrible, but the double-entendre on that question takes the cake:

the retailers can set the amount to be what it feels the market can bare.

I'm hoping that wasn't intentional.

jordan801• 8 years ago

Because they don't care about the moral and psychological aspects of the content filtered. They care about making money and they know that people will buy the opt out.

Gibbon1• 8 years ago

they don't care about the moral and psychological aspects

I disagree. Authoritarians are always obsessed with being able to control peoples access to sex. Because that's a powerful lever you can use to control people.

For instance dominionist evangelicals and polygamist Mormons are obsessed with taking sexual rights away from women and commoditising access. Keeping young people and especially young men from access to porn, same deal.

bediger4000• 8 years ago

Don't you think it's the other way around? Lawmakers want to block free speech and eliminate privacy by using pornography as an excuse?

userbinator2• 8 years ago

Device manufacturers would be forced to install "obscenity filters" on cell phones, tablets, computers, and any other Internet-connected devices.

I vaguely remember reading about a similar effort in China many years ago --- that failed silently.

Trying to tie this into "human trafficking" is a cruel diversion, just like pornography, terrorism, and drugs.

"Let's make the world safer" seems to be the common thread in all of these anti-freedom bills, with the implicit intent of branding those who are against them as supporters of human traffickers, pedophilia, terrorism, or whatever else.

There are two memorable quotes which will become very relevant in the near future:

"If you outlaw freedom, only outlaws will have freedom."

"Those who give up freedom for security deserve neither."

Santosh832• 8 years ago

"If you outlaw freedom, only outlaws will have freedom."

Couldn't help but think of Malcolm Reynolds and his group from the Firefly series, given that I was re-watching it last night.

EggsOnToast• 8 years ago

Trying to tie this into "human trafficking" is a cruel diversion, just like pornography, terrorism, and drugs.

More than that, it's downright frustrating. Human trafficking is a very real problem in America. It's not even just a problem that applies to illegal Asian or Latin American immigrants either (which might sound like a strange distinction but I've met people with this view). Teens are immensely vulnerable as well and it's ridiculous that something this serious is being used as just another tool in the war on pornography that some groups have been waging for decades.

avcdsuia• 8 years ago

You are refering to the Green Dam Youth Escort. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Dam_Youth_Escort

lsc• 8 years ago

"Those who give up freedom for security deserve neither."

so, this is generally attributed to Franklen, and makes a lot more sense in context:

"those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

It's not really that there's a problem with trading freedom for security; we all do that. But mind the exchange rate!

cityofghosts• 8 years ago

China already does this, and it works to a large extent. If you want to do it in a free society it's not too hard...

1. Enforce OSHA workplace safety law on all u.s. porn sets. 2. Enforce international trade rules against labor safety arbitrage, and or create new ones. 3. Enforce copyright law against tube sites that have made a mockery of d.m.c.a 4. Unionize all porn workers

Of course this will never happen... Porn is a symptom of the underlying I'll of our society.. where the accumulation of wealth and power are the only denominators of worth or virtue, then things like OSHA, labor rights, copyright law for small producers, and unions, are all seen as enemies of ,if not progress then the system itself.

If the u.s. loses a war to China because China infiltrated our computers with free porn, while they had mass censorship which prevented it, then American capitalism will have lost the Mandate of Heaven.

In other words... If porn destroys society, it might be a natural feedback loop, a self correcting mechanism whereby unrestrained , brutal greed is kept in check, by the society that glorifies it the most , collapsing in on itself.

I did not think of this myself. A young porn star aka victim made a documentary a few year back, about the disgraced CMU professor who began the true mass industrialization of porn. She called it "McDonald's for sex" or something like that. The point is that you can't apply Harvard business school brutalistic to every human process and expect a positive result.

xorxarle3• 8 years ago

Surely this just isn't even practical, even if it does pass... if the filter has to be installed on the end user device it will be widely known how to bypass it. Why do people even write these rediculous things (the bills in question).

xorxarle3• 8 years ago

That was a serious question. Why write a bill like this? Who gains from it?

Santosh832• 8 years ago

Just to legitimise it in public perception is still a big win for wannabe tyrants. That's a good first step upon which they can incrementally build on and tighten the screws, just like the anti-piracy groups have done. So it's not at all ridiculous. It's devious, and a cunning attempt to gauge how apathetic the public are to their own freedoms.

russdill2• 8 years ago

Don't forget that most new phones have locked bootloaders and cryptographically secure boot processes. If lawmakers required manufactures put a piece of software on every phone, it would be technically possible and very difficult to bypass.

ball_of_lint2• 8 years ago

What about phones that have already been bought? You can easily get a phone today that runs an open source OS and boatloader: As bad as this bill may be, I doubt they could justify confiscating all of them, but short of that there is no way to enforce that law.

Similarly with computers - with a law like this in place Linux cannot exist.

0xcde4c3db• 8 years ago

It bears repeating (perhaps incessantly, given that this kind of proposal keeps popping up) that "obscenity filters" have a long and ugly track record of blocking material about reproductive health, gender studies, and LGBT rights/culture. There used to be a handful of websites that cataloged these incidents back in the '90s, but I don't know if anyone's still doing it. Just punch something like 'Websense LGBT' into your favorite search engine if you have any doubt.

bogomipz• 8 years ago

It's worth notice that many of these same states[1] mentioned in the article lack any interest in enacting an assault weapons ban to protect their citizens from deadly violence.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/national/assaul...

CamperBob2• 8 years ago

No, it isn't. Trading one civil liberty for another is a negative-sum game.

Pyxl101• 8 years ago

It's worth notice that "assault weapons" is a loaded term, that really just means "rifles that are [scary looking | painted black | etc]". It's not a meaningful technical class of weapon distinct from other semiautomatic long guns, or really from handguns. (Handguns can be semiautomatic, can shoot the same caliber ammunition as rifles, and can have the same size magazines.)

In any case, it is reasonable that states have no interest in trying to enact some kind of "assault weapon" ban, because that would be contrary to the United States Constitution: "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed". Just like this "human trafficking" law would be obviously contrary to the Constitution as well. I can't imagine how any lawmaker could seriously consider introducing a bill like is mentioned in the article - I guess it goes to show how corrupt some politicians can be.

No one should expect state legislatures to infringe the rights of the people that are protected by the Constitution. If someone wants to amend the US Constitution to take away either of these safeguards of peoples' rights, then let them propose that honestly instead.

naiveai• 8 years ago

Wow, they're being so goddamn vague with it as well in order to mislead people. "Protecting children" my fucking arse.

justonepost2• 8 years ago

A better way would be to require all browser makers or OS makers add an easy to use child protection filter that can be easily enabled by parents.

This is a serious issue and while the OP bill is obvious censorship, all parents want more easy control.

orangecat• 8 years ago

A better way would be to require all browser makers or OS makers add an easy to use child protection filter that can be easily enabled by parents.

That's still a bad idea, unless we want to criminalize a whole lot of existing software. Suppose I have a Python script that parses HTML from a URL and downloads all the images it finds. Would that be illegal to distribute unless I hook into the OS-level filters? For that matter, what about Python itself?

interfixus• 8 years ago

* all parents want more easy control*

Refuted. I am a parent. I do not want 'more easy control'.

justonepost2• 8 years ago

Really? You don't want to be able to easily ensure that your pre-teens aren't able to easily access violent porn?

Alright, I guess "all" is little hyperbolic. But I think the sentiment stands firm.

I also think we need to avoid censorship as much as possible, and ensure parents have more control by default is the best path forward. Otherwise we'll end up with a solution like the UK has where age registration has to be done by everyone.

tzs• 8 years ago

The gist of the model legislation is this: Device manufacturers would be forced to install "obscenity filters" on cell phones, tablets, computers, and any other Internet-connected devices. Those filters could only be removed if consumers pay a $20 fee.

Assuming that the device manufacturers do not actually want to participate in this, is there anything that stops them from making the removal code be some simple function of the serial number, and throwing up a website that will compute that function for $20? It will quickly get cracked, of course, and for the most part won't serious inconvenience anyone during the time it takes to get the stupid law overturned.

aerotwelve• 8 years ago

Point of personal privilege: I am so embarrassed that Iowa is on that list.

If your state happens to be listed, please remember to vote in November. There has to be serious electoral consequences for every politician who thought it was a good idea to put their name on such an abhorrent piece of legislation.

Freedom of speech is not an in-app purchase.

bb88• 8 years ago

Really, that makes you embarrassed?

Not US Rep. "McCarthy was an American Hero" Steve King? https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/steve-king-iowas-embarr...

Not giving gun permits to the blind? https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/09/08/iowa-g...

Not the Iowa State Basketball Coach making out with the coeds? http://www.iowastatedaily.com/news/article_37ac54e3-06c1-563...

THAT... THAT embarrasses you about Iowa?

echevil2• 8 years ago

Sigh... If the lawmakers want to copy from China, why not copy their gun control laws first and actually save some lives..

mmirate• 8 years ago

Because copying their gun control laws would, at best, not save any lives.

If you outlaw guns, then only outlaws will have guns.

echevil2• 8 years ago

A few decades ago, before China enforced strict gun control laws, gun ownership were also quite common in China, and it was also a big problem. Now China is way more safer than America (in terms of violent crimes)

Well, I was being sarcastic and don’t actually believe it would work that well for US. But gun control laws certainly saved many lives in China, and there is at least hope that it could actually save some American lives. It would make it much harder for new outlaws to obtain guns at least

philsnow• 8 years ago

Anyone who wants to unlock the filters on their devices would have to put their request in writing, show ID, and verify that they’ve been shown a “written warning regarding the potential dangers” of removing the obscenity filter.

A near-future dystopian fiction could involve the opposite, with people being required to show their ID and aver that they've been shown a "written warning regarding the potential dangers" of installing censorship software on their devices, abrogating the decision of what's decent to either the state or to the device manufacturer, and paying $20 for the privilege.

thntk2• 8 years ago

What does porn have to do with free speech and privacy?

thntk2• 8 years ago

Oh, that is so ridiculous that I have to come back and LOL.