Looks like Google is bending to the political will of the USA as well. When will it end. How can I get my uncensored porn.
First it will be beastiality, then Asian fetish, next S and M…soon they will prevent nude political commentaries.
The internet is a haven for the trolls and misfits of society. Will the oppression of geek-haven never end?
Erm… no, completely wrong. Nothing is being censored. The government is asking for a list of what has been searched for, and google is saying “up yours”. AOL, Yahoo and MSN all said “ok, here you are” and you think Google is the one that is bending to the government’s will ? Please explain how that is.
Well I think AC’s post was clearly a little tongue in cheek (add your own joke here, if you must).
Nevertheless, I agree with Matthew that the article does not really seem to describe censorship. (This is not, of course, to say that one could not also object to government investigators asking search engines for information.)
Coincidentally (?), I just read this morning about some big bust of a child pornography ring that was using the internet to broadcast some pretty sick stuff (including, apparently, 18 month-old kids :fume: ).
Hard to say for sure, but my guess is that stories like that one (the child porn bust) may influence the opinions of some people regarding the leeway we give to law enforcement agencies to snoop around on the internet…
Google is doing a fine job of censoring all on its own.
It has to keep its new masters happy… 
Well I think AC’s post was clearly a little tongue in cheek (add your own joke here, if you must).
Nevertheless, I agree with Matthew that the article does not really seem to describe censorship. (This is not, of course, to say that one could not also object to government investigators asking search engines for information.)
Coincidentally (?), I just read this morning about some big bust of a child pornography ring that was using the internet to broadcast some pretty sick stuff (including, apparently, 18 month-old kids :fume: ).
Hard to say for sure, but my guess is that stories like that one (the child porn bust) may influence the opinions of some people regarding the leeway we give to law enforcement agencies to snoop around on the internet.…[/quote]
I saw the same story Hobbes and had a similar reaction. Why not use “any means necessary” to stop this crime against one’s life?
[quote=“jdsmith”]I saw the same story Hobbes and had a similar reaction. Why not use “any means necessary” to stop this crime against one’s life?[/quote]They weren’t posting this stuff on public sites where it can be found on google. The police did go undercover into the chatrooms to catch them.
The information the government would not have caught any child abusers, it was just for a survey.
Because it is too vague of a definition. Is any government entitled to know how people search for information for private use.
If I goto to public libraries around the world and borrow “Catcher and the rye” without returning so that governments could keep tabs on me, that’s another story all together.
Eventually they may even go after “suicide pack” site, where consenting geek adults, without the courage to off themselves, seek support from fellow geeks to arrange group get togethers to go the great beyond together.
By ensuring social misfits and geeks are glued to the computer screen, we can at the very least make sure they are not out in public causing harm to others.
That’s online entrapment. Like that annoying “punch the monkey” banner that floated around a few years ago. Normally I would never hit a monkey. But the way the banner was designed with the crosshairs, and the boxing glove, it was just asking for it…online entrapment another government tool to keep the online geek down.
What the hell does “punch the Monkey” have to do with people using online forums to display videos of the sexual torture of children and INFANTS?
My question is this: would using google better enable the police to find these people and arrest them?
It would seem not. From the article:
So they just want to see how good Google is at its job. Pretty tangential to child pornography. In any case, surely you don’t really think “any means necessary” is OK do you? There is a balance between individuals rights, companies rights and the powers of the law enforcers, no?
Personally, I think this is being gone about in the right way: The government asks for something. Google objects. They go to court. The government comes up with a more reasonable request. Google’s doing what it can to protect the privacy of normal users, the government’s doing what it can to catch criminals, and the law courts are making sure it’s all legal and above board. Everyone’s happy 
Well, I would hope one day internet companies would show a little moral and social fiber and realize that finding and stopping something like child porn online is a thing they SHOULD be helping the authorities do anyway.
If Google could help do this, they should do it willingly.
But that’s just me.
jds
Well, I would hope one day internet companies would show a little moral and social fiber and realize that finding and stopping something like child porn online is a thing they SHOULD be helping the authorities do anyway.
[/quote]
What makes you think that they aren’t already helping the authorities?
In this case Google is contesting the request because it seems to have nothing to do with child pornography and is an unwarranted invasion of privacy. Just because Google doesn’t immediately do everything the government tells them to do doesn’t mean they’re not doing what they should …
Well, I would hope one day internet companies would show a little moral and social fiber and realize that finding and stopping something like child porn online is a thing they SHOULD be helping the authorities do anyway.
[/quote]
What makes you think that they aren’t already helping the authorities?
In this case Google is contesting the request because it seems to have nothing to do with child pornography and is an unwarranted invasion of privacy. Just because Google doesn’t immediately do everything the government tells them to do doesn’t mean they’re not doing what they should …[/quote]
You’re right, I’m confusing the two issues. And I do not know if Google, or any other search engine, is helping authorities track down child sex offenders.
I am only stating that IMHO, they should be helping them. It’s a problem that hurts us all, and they have the tools to do some good.
Sorry for hi-jacking the thread. 
The government wants the data for a pretty legit reason - to get an idea of how much child porn and stuff is out there and to learn more about how net users located it. Google doesn’t really object to that goal, but they are worried about the precedent it sets. The government’s next request could be more invasive, and so on.
The thing about the child porn issue that I’ve always wondered about is why police tend to go after the consumers of it rather than the distributers. If there is a Web site showing illegal images, why not track down the domain holder and bust him? Wouldn’t tht be easier than monitoring everyone to try and catch them downloading something illegal? It is extremely simple to take a domain name and find out who owns it. It is also simple to take a Web site and find out exactly where the physical servers are that host it. So why does the stuff persist? There must be something I don’t understand, or maybe the authorities dont really want to “get rid of” the problem.
[quote=“dearpeter”]The government wants the data for a pretty legit reason - to get an idea of how much child porn and stuff is out there and to learn more about how net users located it. Google doesn’t really object to that goal, but they are worried about the precedent it sets. The government’s next request could be more invasive, and so on.
The thing about the child porn issue that I’ve always wondered about is why police tend to go after the consumers of it rather than the distributers. If there is a Web site showing illegal images, why not track down the domain holder and bust him? Wouldn’t tht be easier than monitoring everyone to try and catch them downloading something illegal? It is extremely simple to take a domain name and find out who owns it. It is also simple to take a Web site and find out exactly where the physical servers are that host it. So why does the stuff persist? There must be something I don’t understand, or maybe the authorities dont really want to “get rid of” the problem.[/quote]
Nice post, dearpeter.
I agree that it would be folly to target only the consumers, and not the producers/distributors.
While not being an expert in the field (then again, this is a discussion forum, and few among us are experts in any of the areas we discuss) my guess would be this: consumers are more likely to be caught – so we hear more stories about them.
First off, the consumers are far more numerous (even if producers are doing far more harm, per capita).
The second (and in my view more important) reason, is that a consumers who are caught with child porn on their computers are easy to identify, and convict. Yes, they can claim “someone else put it there”, or “I thought the people in those were 18” (although the later would be pretty fvcking tough if the subjects were 2 year old kids), but still… once they are caught, they are probably finished.
The search for originators, on the other hand, is far less likely --in any given case-- to prove effective. Keep in mind, the sick SOBs who produce this stuff surely know about anonymous scrambler connections, and websites that hide your location/identity, and so on.
Both due to their smaller number, and their ability to mask their identities, producers are almost certainly going to be caught in fewer cases (relative to consumers).
Obviously, this does not mean that the authorities should not be going after the producers. They should. It just means that when the people who are caught happen to be consumers (as they will be far more likely to be), it does not seem --to me-- to be necessary to ask why the producers aren’t also targeted. Because the producers are targeted as well. They are just fewer of them, and they are better at not getting caught.
Who knows – just my hunch. 
H
Not only that, but the website would be based abroad, in some tinpot country where it would be impossible to get any foreign laws enforced. If it they were based in the UK or US, they would be shipped off to prison faster than you can say Peter Townsend.
Anyway I would guess the majority is not done by websites but by small exclusive “clubs” that only trusted people can get into. Or by P2P, where it’s almost impossible to trace the original perpertraitor.
Just making a point about the nature of how “cops” on message boards work when they try to lure the fetish geek out into public.
fetish geek: Got the vasiline, got the remote keyboard, all ready to go for an evening of safe fun…oop almost forgot the kleenex.
cop as 13 year old: Hi mister fetish geek, my parents are getting a divorce and for revenge I want to lose my virginity and become an adult. Meet me please.
dearpeter,
Managing fetish and sexual desire is nearly impossible. Choose any fetish? You’d be overwhelm trying think of a solution. The law tries to manage these unsocial behavior by driving them underground in the past. But with the information age “underground” is viewable by all with a simple mouse click.
[quote=“ac_dropout”]
Managing fetish and sexual desire is nearly impossible. [/quote]
I agree with that, certainly, but I think there is a moral obligation on the state to do what it can to prevent harm to children. What I mean is, pedophiles should be forced to be content with pornographic art, say manga, and pictures of kids with their clothes on. That is, actual child pornography, and especially the production and distribution of it, should be outlawed and punished.
Why can’t the UN and ICANN work together to deactivate any IP address (URL or whatever) that knowingly displays illegal images? If there were a system in place, do-gooders could simply track down the offending Websites and report them. A staffer confirms the site’s existence and its URL is simply deactivated. I don’t see why that’s not possible.
I know it’s censorship, but I don’t care. The protection of life and freedom from violence is more important in this case, especially since it involves children. (And maybe animals should be included too. See this thread, New sport in China - stomp the rabbit - kitty - puppy)
It would not, of course, completely stop people from using the Internet to distribute child porn, but it would help a lot and help stop making it easy for people to get it through the good ole’ WWW. Sure, file sharing (and FTP) is another issue, but with file sharing people will need to download before they can see things, so they’ll only have filenames to go by.
Heck, right now most of the pedophile busts result from men using their credit cards to buy child porn online. If people can actually get credit card companies to process their sales of child porn on WWW sites, then I’d say enforcement on the distribution side of things is totally lax.
Like I said, maybe there is a good reason, but I haven’t heard it yet.
When Google was an infant company, it learned some searches just did not come out right. A search for “Asian woman” would list an inordinate number of results for porn sites in the top 10 results, for example. They now tailor their engine to give “cleaner” searches that make the Internet appear to be less pornographic that it really is. This helps keep people focused at work and prevents lurid things from interfering with their daily tasks. Censorship is necessary for productivity, but it does mask the truth. Google became more popular as the searches it produced helped people get what they wanted from the Internet faster. The last thing a women’s study major wants to see when looking for info about Asian women is porn sites, where as a lover of Asian woman porn would not type in “Asian woman” to get what he or she wants anyway. Funny thing is, I trust Google more than the US government to censor correctly because they are making money from it, whereas the US is interested in reflecting American values, which are not bad but sometimes a little contrived.