1) How can the number of blocked hits be equated with "attempts to
view illegal child pornography"? Since it's blocked (which it does by
generating a 404 error) the person browsing won't know what's there.
It could be a link he's found somewhere and wants to know what it
points to, which he repeatedly tries to access, generating a fresh
'hit' each time for BT to brag about.

2) I'm surprised that 80% of ISPs use Cleanfeed. How can we find out
which ones provide uncensored access to the Web, thank you very much?

3) Carr is setting himself up as public censor-in-chief, not only
deciding what we are allowed to see, but how it is to be enforced. And
of course these MPs he's going to pester won't be given any idea what
*actually* is being blocked.

News article:
---------------------------------------
BT SOUNDS CHILD WEB PORN WARNING

BBC News, UK: 7 February 2006
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4687904.stm

The number of attempts to view illegal child pornography on the web
has risen sharply since 2004, according to BT.

The company has a system to block sites carrying indecent images of
children and over the past four months it has been thwarting 35,000
hits each day.

When BT first launched its Cleanfeed system 18 months ago, there were
just over 10,000 attempted hits every day.

Children's groups have repeated calls for all internet service
providers to prevent access to illegal websites.

BT's blocking technology forbids access to sites blacklisted by the
Internet Watch Foundation, which monitors illegal activity on the web.

Most of the bigger service providers use similar blocking technology
to BT, but there is continuing pressure on all UK providers to follow
suit.

The foundation blacklisted more than 6,000 websites in 2005 - up from
3,500 in the previous year.

'Outer limits'

The IWF assesses whether websites are "illegal to view" under the 1978
Child Protection Act.

John Carr, an internet adviser to the children's charity NCH, has
welcomed the work being done by BT and other companies.

However, he believes the current system of self-regulation is
"reaching its outer limits".

He told BBC Radio Five Live that "unless the industry can show pretty
quickly that they're at or close to 100% coverage in Britain, I'm
afraid we will be going to talk to our MPs... demanding legislation".

He said that as BT estimated it had one-third of the market, to
extrapolate across the whole domestic internet market would mean there
were 100,000 hits per day or 4 million per year.

Proven technology

According to the industry about 80% of domestic internet users in the
UK are covered by BT Cleanfeed-type solutions, he said, but he also
raised concerns that there was "some scepticism" about that figure and
called for it to be independently verified.

"Even if it's true, it means that one in five domestic internet users
could access these illegal sites without any obstacles at all.

"That is not acceptable. It needs to be 100%.

"BT has proven that the technology works so there really isn't any
excuse for any internet service provider not doing it," Mr Carr added.

Brave New Britain wrote:
> 1) How can the number of blocked hits be equated with "attempts to
> view illegal child pornography"? Since it's blocked (which it does by
> generating a 404 error) the person browsing won't know what's there.
> It could be a link he's found somewhere and wants to know what it
> points to, which he repeatedly tries to access, generating a fresh
> 'hit' each time for BT to brag about.
> 
> 2) I'm surprised that 80% of ISPs use Cleanfeed. How can we find out
> which ones provide uncensored access to the Web, thank you very much?
> 
> 3) Carr is setting himself up as public censor-in-chief, not only
> deciding what we are allowed to see, but how it is to be enforced. And
> of course these MPs he's going to pester won't be given any idea what
> *actually* is being blocked.
> 
> News article:

<snipped>

an old article at The Register hits on the comment you made in point 1

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/21/ispa_bt_cleanfeed/

I don't know if BT ever responded.

Robbie

Brave New Britain wrote:
> 1) How can the number of blocked hits be equated with "attempts to
> view illegal child pornography"? Since it's blocked (which it does by
> generating a 404 error) the person browsing won't know what's there.
> It could be a link he's found somewhere and wants to know what it
> points to, which he repeatedly tries to access, generating a fresh
> 'hit' each time for BT to brag about.
> 
> 2) I'm surprised that 80% of ISPs use Cleanfeed. How can we find out
> which ones provide uncensored access to the Web, thank you very much?
> 
> 3) Carr is setting himself up as public censor-in-chief, not only
> deciding what we are allowed to see, but how it is to be enforced. And
> of course these MPs he's going to pester won't be given any idea what
> *actually* is being blocked.
> 
> News article:
> ---------------------------------------
> BT SOUNDS CHILD WEB PORN WARNING
> 
> BBC News, UK: 7 February 2006
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4687904.stm
> 
> The number of attempts to view illegal child pornography on the web
> has risen sharply since 2004, according to BT.
> 
> The company has a system to block sites carrying indecent images of
> children and over the past four months it has been thwarting 35,000
> hits each day.
> 
> When BT first launched its Cleanfeed system 18 months ago, there were
> just over 10,000 attempted hits every day.


Ah, BT marketing dept have hit on a cynical new way to force other ISPs to 
use their products. I've seen this story before, BT produce it regularly 
whenever their marketing department tries to whip up enthusiasm for 
cleanfeed.

In uk.legal Brave New Britain  wrote:
> 1) How can the number of blocked hits be equated with "attempts to
> view illegal child pornography"? Since it's blocked (which it does by
> generating a 404 error) the person browsing won't know what's there.
> It could be a link he's found somewhere and wants to know what it
> points to, which he repeatedly tries to access, generating a fresh
> 'hit' each time for BT to brag about.

It cannot. It might well be a graphic button loaded when visiting
a totally different site - I believe some of the sites that distribute
copyrighted software or keys to software often have such links.

The concept of a 'hit' can be easily expanded by those wishing to
do so... an HTML page with 20 graphics would in most people's eyes
be regarded as one hit - however unscrupulous web hosting/designing
companies will classify it as 21 hits.

And then it might be a totally innocent site sharing the same IP
number as a dodgy site.

> 2) I'm surprised that 80% of ISPs use Cleanfeed. How can we find out
> which ones provide uncensored access to the Web, thank you very much?
 
> 3) Carr is setting himself up as public censor-in-chief, not only
> deciding what we are allowed to see, but how it is to be enforced. And
> of course these MPs he's going to pester won't be given any idea what
> *actually* is being blocked.

I wonder how long before the emphasis expands to include political matters.

Axel

>>1) How can the number of blocked hits be equated with "attempts to
>>view illegal child pornography"? Since it's blocked (which it does by
>>generating a 404 error) the person browsing won't know what's there.
>>It could be a link he's found somewhere and wants to know what it
>>points to, which he repeatedly tries to access, generating a fresh
>>'hit' each time for BT to brag about.
> 
> It cannot. It might well be a graphic button loaded when visiting
> a totally different site - I believe some of the sites that distribute
> copyrighted software or keys to software often have such links.
> 
> The concept of a 'hit' can be easily expanded by those wishing to
> do so... an HTML page with 20 graphics would in most people's eyes
> be regarded as one hit - however unscrupulous web hosting/designing
> companies will classify it as 21 hits.

In my experience of analysing web hit statistics, I have found that 
typically 85-90% of "hits" are actually search engine robots that are 
automatically scanning the web (usually at night-time) trying to index 
it. For example, googlebot accounts for well over 50% of my own web-site 
hits. Such accesses shouldn't really be counted at all as they are not 
human, but of course the statistics don't look so impressive with robots 
factored out.

The inflation of "hits" caused by the counting of "files" rather than 
"pages" also accounts for a considerable number.

Overall, web hits statistics should never be trusted.

In uk.legal Robert Hunt  wrote:

>>>1) How can the number of blocked hits be equated with "attempts to
>>>view illegal child pornography"? Since it's blocked (which it does by
>>>generating a 404 error) the person browsing won't know what's there.
>>>It could be a link he's found somewhere and wants to know what it
>>>points to, which he repeatedly tries to access, generating a fresh
>>>'hit' each time for BT to brag about.
 
>> It cannot. It might well be a graphic button loaded when visiting
>> a totally different site - I believe some of the sites that distribute
>> copyrighted software or keys to software often have such links.
 
>> The concept of a 'hit' can be easily expanded by those wishing to
>> do so... an HTML page with 20 graphics would in most people's eyes
>> be regarded as one hit - however unscrupulous web hosting/designing
>> companies will classify it as 21 hits.
 
> In my experience of analysing web hit statistics, I have found that 
> typically 85-90% of "hits" are actually search engine robots that are 
> automatically scanning the web (usually at night-time) trying to index 
> it. For example, googlebot accounts for well over 50% of my own web-site 
> hits. Such accesses shouldn't really be counted at all as they are not 
> human, but of course the statistics don't look so impressive with robots 
> factored out.

Quite... when I was contracting for a company some years ago we
provided monthly logs... excluding graphics... which included the
web pages accessed and then a break down of the IP address/domain
names which connected to their sites, although the two were not
matched.

We were very honest about the accourting procedure and this was
appreciated by clients once it had been expalined to them.
 
> The inflation of "hits" caused by the counting of "files" rather than 
> "pages" also accounts for a considerable number.
 
> Overall, web hits statistics should never be trusted.

Exactly.

Axel