{"id":9659,"date":"2006-05-17T14:23:59","date_gmt":"2006-05-17T21:23:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2006\/05\/17\/dumb-filters.html"},"modified":"2013-06-05T10:29:48","modified_gmt":"2013-06-05T16:29:48","slug":"dumb_filters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/05\/17\/dumb_filters.html","title":{"rendered":"Dumb Filters"},"content":{"rendered":"

If it weren’t that so many schools and libraries are required to use Internet content filters, as opposed to dumb, set-and-forget home users, this sort of thing would be funny<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cInternet Filters\u201d updates and expands upon an earlier survey published by the Brennan Center\u2019s Free Expression Policy Project (FEPP) in 2001. The new report describes the effects of CIPA and the deceptiveness of manufacturers\u2019 claims to have improved the accuracy of filters with sophisticated \u201cartificial intelligence\u201d techniques. It then describes nearly 100 tests and studies up through 2006, with hundreds of examples of both deliberate and accidental overblocking.<\/p>\n

For instance, one filtering program, SurfWatch, blocked the University of Kansas\u2019s Archie R. Dykes Medical Library website upon detecting the word \u201cdykes.\u201d Cyber Patrol blocked a Knights of Columbus site and a site for aspiring dentists when set to block only \u201csexually explicit\u201d materials. SmartFilter blocked the Declaration of Independence, Shakespeare\u2019s complete plays, Moby Dick, and Marijuana: Facts for Teens, a brochure published by the National Institute on Drug Abuse. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s a tough one. How do you keep kids from cruising for free porn (or inadvertently stumbling across it) on library and school computers. Answer: you probably can’t, any mroe than you can keep them from cruising for sex in the fiction and non-fiction sections of the library (or inadvertently stumbling across it, as well).<\/p>\n

What you can do is try to reach a compromise between privacy (people may be doing “legitimate” private stuff on a library computer, like checking their e-mail) and publicity (computer areas should be well lit and visible), so that you keep such locations from being the equivalent of darkened peep shows. That’s a compromise likely to please nobody, but it’s the best one possible without engaging in ths sort of futile filtering (and overblocking) described above.<\/p>\n

(via BoingBoing<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If it weren’t that so many schools and libraries are required to use Internet content filters, as opposed to dumb, set-and-forget home users, this sort of thing would be funny….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[20,371,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hi-tech","category-war-on-drugs","category-zt-pc"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4112,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/02\/04\/filtered_by_the.html","url_meta":{"origin":9659,"position":0},"title":"Filtered by their own petard","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 4-Feb-03 11:36am","format":false,"excerpt":"I find it wildly amusing that British MPs are finding their e-mail blocked by content filters put onto their system. Discussion about censorship bills and sexual offenses legislation, among other...","rel":"","context":"In "ZT & PC"","block_context":{"text":"ZT & PC","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/zt-pc"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4562,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/08\/06\/spamming_secret.html","url_meta":{"origin":9659,"position":1},"title":"Spamming secrets","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 6-Aug-03 2:40pm","format":false,"excerpt":"An interesting presentation on tricks spammers use to get their mail past various filters. Though the presentation is very POPfile oriented, it's applicable to all spam filters. I got the...","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging & Internet"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging & Internet","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":192,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/06\/02\/filters.html","url_meta":{"origin":9659,"position":2},"title":"Filters","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 2-Jun-03 7:07am","format":false,"excerpt":"Don'tcha wish certain blogs had filters? Like you could just click a button, and say, \"Hey, I like the posts Joe-Bob makes on Movies, Work, and Cheese, but I wish...","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging & Internet"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging & Internet","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8997,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/03\/08\/tracked_back.html","url_meta":{"origin":9659,"position":3},"title":"Tracked back","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 8-Mar-06 10:15am","format":false,"excerpt":"Had the first successful trackback spam here in quite some time today. Not entirely certain what they did to spoof past all the various filters and the like (and loosening...","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging & Internet"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging & Internet","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3966,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/03\/05\/filtering_tips.html","url_meta":{"origin":9659,"position":4},"title":"Filtering tips","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 5-Mar-03 4:16pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The Supremes today heard arguments regarding CIPA, the latest attempt by Congress to mandate Internet content filtering at libraries and schools. Congress tried to get around two previous judicial rejections...","rel":"","context":"In "ZT & PC"","block_context":{"text":"ZT & PC","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/zt-pc"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3129,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/08\/06\/its_so_sad_sad.html","url_meta":{"origin":9659,"position":5},"title":"It’s so sad … sad … sad …","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 6-Aug-02 12:03pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The heart-aches and heart-breaks of a spammer: \"My operating costs have gone up 1,000 percent this year, just so I can figure out how to get around all these filters,\"...","rel":"","context":"In "Spam"","block_context":{"text":"Spam","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/computer-security\/spam"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9659","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9659"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9659\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37489,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9659\/revisions\/37489"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}