Re: Civil liberties threatened by IWF censorship?
Interview with Sarah Robertson, director of communications for the
Internet Watch Foundation
Wednesday 08 April 2009
The following is the full transcript from Broadband Genie editor Chris
Marling's interview with Sarah Robertson (pictured), director of
communications for the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF). We spoke in
depth about all of the issues brought up in comments by our site
visitors the last time we ran a story involving the organisation. This
included its role and remit, accusations of secrecy and censorship,
the governments 100 per cent take-up target for its blocking
initiative, how the blocking initiative works, and how effective it
is. There is also a full explanation of the unfortunate Wikipedia
incident that generated so much bad press for the IWF in December.
What is the IWF?
"The IWF is an organisation with charitable status, founded in 1996 by
the internet industry, which wanted to do its best to address the fact
it could inadvertently be hosting illegal content. It was founded to
be a free reporting mechanism for the public and a national 'notice
and take down' service for host ISPs - and to do that freely,
regardless of membership. It is a self-regulatory body founded and
funded by the industry and led by the industry itself, under the
direction of an independent board.
"One of the founders of the IWF was Peter Dawe, Cambridge internet
entrepreneur and founder of Pipex. He had a building just outside of
Cambridge, which is still our home.
"We have an independent chair and board which includes three industry
members: each of the 90 member companies elect a representative to a
funding council, which in turn directs its policies and work
programmes and has overall responsibility for issues such as ensuring
budget. That funding council elects three of its members to also stand
on the board.
"The IWF's charitable status ensures a more robust governance
structure, as we have to adhere to both company and charity law: we
have to be accountable and transparent in how we behave and report our
activities. We're wholly independent of government, although benefit
from it supporting the UK self-regulatory approach: certainly, when it
comes to the blocking initiative, that independence is crucial.
"An independent board is no small thing; there is a board of 10
trustees, three board committees and a board sub committee. Because
we're dealing with illegal images, we have a memorandum of
understanding with the Crown Prosecution Service and the Association
of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), giving us special dispensation in the
Sexual Offences Act (which amended the Child Protection Act) so we can
do our work. We're not a legal body, as such, but we have the
authority to do what we do and couldn't do this without support of key
partners such as the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre
(CEOP) and the government."
What is your stance on self-regulation over legislation, and the
government's target of getting 100 per cent of UK ISPs signed up to
the IWF and using your blocking list?
"Self-regulation can be far more responsive than legislation,
especially in an arena such as the internet which is changing all the
time. If we had to rely on policy being developed, it would be out of
date by the time it was passed.
"Our key industry stakeholders think robust and inclusive consultation
procedures mean you can respond immediately. We think the fact nearly
100 per cent of residential broadband connections in the UK are
covered, in addition to some business providers and all mobile
operators, as well as filtering companies, is extremely impressive.
All of this has been achieved on a voluntary basis as a result of the
industrys own commitment to good practice.
"Were not in the business of naming and shaming, but would certainly
encourage ISPs to take our list. However, on a wider scale, it's
important they are part of the self-regulatory approach to illegal
content through association with the IWF. They can then contribute to
showing the way the industry can be responsible for itself, so
avoiding potentially more restrictive legislation by finding solutions
itself.
"While some (such as the NSPCC) are calling for 100 per cent take-up
of the scheme from ISPs, and the government has said it aims for the
same 100 per cent figure, we're just proud of our achievements to
date. And we're happy to work with the government in trying to work
through any fears companies may have in joining, whether they be
technical or philosophical.
"The fact is, if this was television, there would not even be a
debate, but the internets unrestricted and global nature means
certain groups and individuals are very protective of its freedom and
very concerned about attempts to curtail that freedom. These
principles are really important but have to be balanced by the fact
that internet services are abused for the distribution of child sexual
abuse images. Believe it or not, the IWF considers itself anti-
censorship and we certainly wouldnt want our efforts in disrupting
the activities of a criminal few to damage the freedoms of the vast
majority. Those advocates of freedoms of expression on the internet
are key stakeholders for us and weve always looked to engage with
them."
How do you respond to accusations the IWF is a secretive organisation?
"We have one of the most comprehensive websites imaginable. We publish
annual reports, details of board members and senior staff, board
minutes, full lists of members (and who takes the list), full funding
details, a monthly e-newsletter and we respond to external enquiries.
The whole blocking initiative is described and theres a huge FAQ
section, as we recognise the importance of explaining our role in
providing this list, plus a complaints procedure anything you could
want to know about blocking has always been available. Full contact
details are also online, including our address. In fact our website is
arguably too comprehensive, as information can be hard to come by; a
fact we've recognised and why we are in the process or redesigning our
site.
"The IWF is subject to regular inspection by independent forensic and
technical experts, as well as HR professionals and police officers.
And the block list isnt secret: of course it cannot be published, and
the public cant comment on it, but every URL on it is shared with law
enforcement and with hotlines around the world and the process of
adding URLs to it is is independently inspected. Misuse of our trusted
role in providing a list would quickly come to light.
"While weve never been secretive about our initiative, unfortunately
probably not that many people knew about it: people would probably
have been quite reassured if they had. Certainly our member companies
try to publicise it as one of the services they offer.
"But suddenly a lot of people became aware of us due to a censorship
debate over the legitimacy of an image [see 'The Wiki Incident' below]
which for us was a shame, because bringing down Wikipedia, or picking
on record covers, isnt what we do; what we do is deal with illegal
abuse images.
"The website redesign is happening because, at the time of the Wiki
incident, valid commentators were posing questions that were in fact
already extremely comprehensively answered on the IWFs website. It
was frustrating: in providing too much information people couldn't
find the right information, which led to charges of secrecy."
Can you explain the IWF's actual role and remit?
"The list of URLs we provide to our members is just part of our
service; it is not part of our core role or remit. We were founded to
be a free public report mechanism and a free take-down service for UK
ISPs: that is what we do. We also work internationally to share
intelligence on child sexual abuse websites and share data with police
and other relevant authorities. Regarding our remit, we were formed to
deal with child sexual abuse content and criminally obscene content,
such as illegal adult pornography. In 2004 incitement to racial hatred
content was added. It has not changed since.
"I have read plenty of rhetoric about what we may or may not be doing,
but the remit hasnt crept on behind peoples backs. If and when we
are invited to take on any new kind of content which could happen,
as there are lots of types of content worrying the government and the
public we have a very strong consultation process: any change to our
remit would see a robust consultation with our board and with our
member companies and it would only be taken on if they wanted us to do
so. And any change would be made very clear and be well publicised.
"In fact the IWF websites reporting mechanism [for reporting content]
only lets the public report child abuse, obscene, or incitement to
racial hatred sites: there is no other button. Anything else should be
pointed to sites such as e-victims.org or CEOP.
"Also, crucially, we dont deal with people, just content. We dont
investigate a persons crimes, we just try to minimise the
availability of illegal online content. Its quite a specific role.
However, if despite the design of the reporting form, someone reports
that a child is in danger, for example, or that someone is being
groomed, or that they think someone has downloaded illegal content, we
will pass that information on to the relevant police agency.
"We welcome many kinds of new members. It may not be the list they
benefit from; they are not forced to take it, although most providers
do. They may be more interested in the CSR [corporate social
responsibility] benefits, or the fact they want to support the
national notice and take-down body. But companies dont have to join
us: there is no levy system as there is with other self-regulatory
bodies.
"The IWF is also recommended by bodies such as ISPA [the Internet
Service Providers Association] and three quarters of its funding comes
from the industry [a quarter is provided by the EUs Safer Internet
initiative]. Whilst we could not operate without support from the
government, it is important we work in partnership with the people
involved in the industry, who know better than anyone how it works."
How do you respond to claims of censorship from the IWF?
"The blocking initiative was industry led. In 2004, our members asked
whether we could provide a list so they could offer an extra level of
protection to consumers.
"The list was never designed to try to stop offenders having access to
this content: we understand those people are often technologically
sophisticated and easily able to circumvent network level blocking.
The industry simply wanted to try and do something else to protect its
customers and it was only ever seen as part of the solution, alongside
all of the other strands of our work designed to combat this content.
"It was then designed and developed to be as simple as possible, while
being comprehensive. It is URL specific and designed hand-in-hand with
the industry. A lot of members now have different post-processing
systems, so the list is simply URLs ISPs then make it work on their
particular platforms. Since 2004, many more ISPs now offer this added
protection to their customers. In addition, all the mobile operators
take it, search providers and filtering companies take it: it is
fantastic evidence of a voluntary initiative where an industry is
doing its best to demonstrate good practice.
"There are many debates going on in parliament, the media and society
in general around harmful and inappropriate internet content: we have
no role in that. Who can define what is harmful and inappropriate? For
example, there are widely differing views on pornography. We try to
remain neutral: we are dealing with widely diverse stakeholders with
quite different views. Certainly we are happy to share our experience
where useful or relevant.
"ISPs block malware, spyware, viruses, and no one seems to mind. The
charge that were in some way the only people blocking content is
unfounded. ISPs have the right to block whatever they choose, possibly
above and beyond the list we provide, under their own terms and
conditions.
"Will our remit grow? I dont know that would be a matter for our
board and member companies. But I think we are successful because our
role is quite specific: it concentrates on three very specific illegal
areas. We certainly have no plans to increase the block list to other
forms of content."
More specifically, some accuse you of being the only body of your kind
outside of regimes such as China's?
"Blocking is designed to cause as little collateral damage as
possible, hence it being URL specific. And, importantly, the UK
approach only involves indecent images of children when it comes to
blocking.
"Plenty of other countries, including many across Europe, have seen
successes after seeing this voluntary approach being so successful in
the UK. This is sometimes government led, or police led, and can
involve DNS poisoning or other kinds of more damaging blocking: I
would say the UK approach bears up pretty well in comparison.
"So, there are many other blocking initiatives and many other Hotlines
we work with more than 30 around the world as part of the INHOPE
[International Association of Internet Hotlines] association all
working to fight child sexual abuse websites."
What can the blocking initiative really do? Is it effective?
"The core of what we do is addressing reports from the public. If they
are concerned about content theyve stumbled across, it is important
the public is able to report this somewhere. Wider society wants a
safe internet they dont mind their children using.
"The blocking initiative can disrupt the activities of those supplying
and accessing images while reducing the amount of times innocent
internet users are exposed. Crucially it reduces the number of times
the images themselves are viewed, as this perpetuates the victims
original exploitation.
"We get around 35,000 individual internet hotline reports per year
around a third are then confirmed as potentially illegal. Last year
there were less than 3,000 child sexual abuse websites identified, a
tiny proportion of the internet, but they must be tackled. Blocking
wont bring them down but it does help disrupt activities. Of course,
the only lasting solution is removal at source and were working at
that too.
"However, that is very difficult, as the majority is hosted abroad, so
we cant affect a take-down. However, we are looking at how we could
do more in that area. Most of these sites are commercial operations,
selling abuse images. They have very complicated business models with
lots of servers, payment mechanisms and redirectors: this complex set-
up makes them quite resilient to take down. Content moves every few
days to different servers in different countries.
"But this is very rarely in the UK; we have a strong reputation for
being a very hostile online space for illegal content. It does still
happen occasionally, and we still do have a take-down role here, but
its minimal. The bulk of the content is hosted in the US, where the
scale of the internet traffic and services and the number of providers
makes it a difficult challenge for our partner bodies. Here in the UK
we have great links with the industry, and the industry is smaller, so
take-down is an easier process. But dont forget that regardless of
where the content is hosted, the children are being abused, the sites
are being operated and the images are being accessed from all around
the world.
"We are also contributing to the European Financial Coalition to help
track payment mechanisms and therefore trace those running the
websites."
Some claim you do not inform websites that they have been blocked. Is
this the case?
"Any UK URL is immediately put through the notice and take-down
procedure: the hosting company is informed and the content is removed,
in partnership with the police, which ensures any evidence is secured.
"More than three-quarters of the list is made up of commercial child
abuse websites, which may well be hosted by a less than legitimate
host company: the IWF would not have a role in alerting a site that
was perhaps already under investigation that it knows about them.
Furthermore, as no UK-based URLs are put on the list, there may well
be jurisdiction issues meaning a UK body cannot approach that non-UK
company. Again, this might also undermine a police investigation.
"What we do is pass on details of every URL to the equivalent hotline
in that country and/or law enforcement in that country, according to
the code of practice between all hotlines and the law enforcement
involved. In this way, the hotline and law enforcement agencies can
enforce the laws appropriate to the offences within their own
boundaries."
Does this make it harder to identify real abusers? Or just drive them
underground?
"This is hard to quantify and I dont think the IWF has the answer.
Certainly images are sold or exchanged in other ways, for example via
newsgroups or peer-to-peer. While we work to combat such content in
newsgroups, we do not have a role dealing with peer-to-peer that is
a matter for our police partner. But the commercial sites often arent
trying to hide theyre trying to sell images.
"Whilst there is a very small number of websites, they are very hard
to combat. There are still a significant number of not-for-profit
sites where paedophiles exchange images, which people wont stumble
upon. The abuser, or someone very close to them, often runs or
contributes to these sites and users contribute their own sexually
abusive images.
"The key is disruption at many levels (be it through take-down, domain
name deregistration, blocking or bringing down payment mechanisms) and
data sharing at home and abroad. It is important to remember the
internet didnt create paedophiles, but the fantastic freedom of
information the internet allows for is no reason not to challenge the
distribution of sexually abusive images of children.
"What is often overlooked are the sentiments of those abused: for
them, the thought of those images being viewed over and over again
often over many years, as the images filter out from private sites to
commercial ones can be almost as bad as the abuse itself."
There are sceptics who suggest self-regulation is simply a smokescreen
to avoid legislation from an industry that knows what it is doing is
not really effective.
"Its not a PR stunt. Both the industry and the government want self-
regulation to work, and it is working. The IWF can show that 18 per
cent of child abuse content was hosted in the UK when it was first
formed: that figure has been less than 1 per cent since 2003. The UK
is doing a great job, and the data it is sharing all around the world
is helping other countries to address the issues too.
"With the founding of coalitions such as the European Financial
Coalition, law enforcement agencies with the help of organisations
such as the IWF are getting to grips with payment mechanisms and
chasing the money trail behind the commercial sites. Dont forget, the
number of child sexual abuse websites is decreasing, the situation is
improving."
Any closing comments?
"One significant technical problem in five years of providing a list
is quite an achievement when dealing with network level blocking,
especially as there are 60 companies implementing the list in
different ways across different platforms, and that list is updated
twice a day.
"We have been working for over 12 years and one of our main jobs is to
help foster trust and reassurance in the internet: slowing it down,
compromising it or restricting it is not our business. People need to
put their faith in the IWF, and we should move on from the censorship
debate: I wouldn't want my internet content censored at all, but I
would be quite happy for a trusted independent organisation to be able
to work in partnership with the internet industry to make a difference
in the supply and access of child sexual abuse images.
"The IWF is more than a list, which is a very small part of what we
do: we are actually getting on with exactly what people want us to be
doing focusing on getting the content removed and informing the
processes which gets those responsible investigated. Its really not
about censorship. And, if blocking is going to happen, who would you
rather facilitate it? Were not secretive and there are no hidden
agendas. If you want to know more about our work visit our website
(www.iwf.org.uk) and if its not mentioned there then were not doing
it!"
The Wiki incident
"On Friday, December 5, a Wikipedia URL was actioned by the IWF. It
was judged to be potentially illegal. The IWF isnt the law and it
doesnt pretend to be it acts in accordance with UK legislation and
with the support of the police, but doesnt try to pre-empt a jury by
declaring conclusive illegality. What it does is recommend that
certain content is blocked through the provision of a voluntary list,
requested by the industry.
"It was done with the best intentions, in line with IWF procedures,
according to UK legislation, and with subsequent support (through the
appeals procedure) of our law enforcement partners. However, what
began as a simple blocked URL escalated into much more.
"Many ISPs block by using a two-stage filter. Therefore, most UK
internet traffic going to Wikipedia was going through various ISPs
second stage filter, which meant it appeared to be from the filters
IP address. Wikipedia has a policy of banning people it doesn't want
vandalising its pages and could no longer differentiate who it needed
to ban from the UK, so it simply banned all UK editors.
"Some critics focused on the fact we didnt just block the image and
that by blocking the page, legitimate text was also affected. URLs for
the images are put onto the lists as well as the URLs for the page
containing the image, however adding the image URL to the list doesnt
necessarily mean the embedded image wont be visible. Also, because
the majority of the content on the list is on commercial child sexual
abuse sites, they use tactics such as splintering images across a
number of different remote servers on different host companies in
different countries: there isn't just one image sitting somewhere, so
its not as simple as just blocking the images with most of the sites
we deal with. We're not generally in the business of blocking text,
and certainly not legitimate debate, but for these reasons we block
the URL of the page depicting the image, therefore other content on
that page will be affected.
"There was a history behind this image that meant Wikipedia felt
justified in keeping it up, and certainly they refused to remove it.
Of course they don't have exactly the same laws or approach in
America. Incidentally, I understand that the band involved (the image
was a Scorpions record cover) have since come out admitting regret at
using the image, and that they were bullied into it.
"Child sex images are graded one to five according to the Sentencing
Guidelines Council. They are all illegal. Level one would, for
example, depict no sexual activity but erotic posing; these may go on
the list as the beginning of a series of illegal images which get
increasingly more serious. Level four is penetration; level five would
include bestiality or sadism. Level one can be seen as the least
severe, as there is no physical sexual exploitation being captured in
the shot, although in most cases it is very young children, for
example with their legs being held apart.
"Of course there is nothing inherently wrong with naked children or
pictures of naked children. What you have to remember is that the bulk
of our work focuses on commercial websites which are selling a range
of indecent or abusive images under monthly subscriptions to offenders
all around the world and that puts a very different slant on whether
there is an abusive aspect to an images distribution.
"It was a testing time for us. We managed to convene two board
meetings while dealing with all the media and public attention, agreed
a unanimous board decision to remove a URL from the list, and turned
around an appeals process involving senior law enforcement all in
just two working days. I would say that is a very good example of a
responsive organisation, acting swiftly and in the publics interest.
"The technical issues over whether it could happen again are not just
an issue for us as the IWF doesn't block the URLs, we supply a list
under contract. However, I understand that a number of ISPs have now
made sure Wikipedia has the IP address of the stage two filter if
they use two stage filtering to ensure a blanket ban wouldn't happen
again in the future.
"We really are working hard to avoid the technical issues with the
Wikipedia URL happening again. It damages the reputation of what is a
great initiative and damages our reputation in being trusted to carry
out our work in a reliable way. We want to move on from the Wikipedia
incident but also to do everything we can do to make sure there is
even less chance of collateral damage to the internet as a result of
our work in the future.
"While we didn't enjoy the criticism, we certainly welcomed the review
of how we work; we're a learning organisation and are pleased this
brought on a review of issues such as the transparency of landing
pages for blocked URL requests; the importance of even more
independent oversight of the list; as well as the issue of possible
additional criteria to be considered when actioning a URL. There are
a number of other actions that can be taken instead of, or in
conjunction with, adding a URL to the list. We want to make sure we
have the best approach and that our systems are suitably responsive.
"The only intent was to minimise the circulation of an indecent image,
which had been considered potentially illegal under UK legislation.
With hindsight, it is clear that our actions didnt achieve our aim to
minimise the availability of such content. Unfortunately, what is a
very positive initiative was only seen in the context of censorship,
which it shouldnt have been. But because it was an image people
considered as borderline, a few felt they could reproduce it."
Comments
Post a comment
By Dr Nigel Leigh Oldfield | 08 Apr 2009 20:42
"And the block list isnt secret: of course it cannot be
published ..." Why not? "The blocking initiative was industry led. In
2004, our members asked whether we could provide a list so they could
offer an extra level of protection to consumers. "The list was never
designed to try to stop offenders having access to this content:"
Rewriting history. "Blocking is designed to cause as little collateral
damage as possible, hence it being URL specific. And, importantly, the
UK approach only involves indecent images of children when it comes to
blocking". *Potentially* indecent. "Of course, the only lasting
solution is removal at source and were working at that too." ? "But
the commercial sites often arent trying to hide theyre trying to
sell images." Rolling Eyes "Whilst there is a very small number of
websites, they are very hard to combat." Pardon? "There are still a
significant number of not-for-profit sites where paedophiles exchange
images, which people wont stumble upon. ****The abuser, or someone
very close to them, often runs or contributes to these sites and users
contribute their own sexually abusive images.****" "significant
number"? Starred bit ... I won't even bother commenting. "What is
often overlooked are the sentiments of those abused: for them, the
thought of those images being viewed over and over again often over
many years, as the images filter out from private sites to commercial
ones can be almost as bad as the abuse itself." Evidence? "Were not
secretive and there are no hidden agendas. If you want to know more
about our work visit our website (www.iwf.org.uk) and if its not
mentioned there then were not doing it!" Really? Can I send you 10
questions for you to answer? "What you have to remember is that the
bulk of our work focuses on commercial websites which are selling a
range of indecent or abusive images under monthly subscriptions to
offenders all around the world" Simple BS, unless you you wish to use
*abuse* in its blanket and useless sense. I really cannot be bothered
with the remaining, empty rhetoric. WM CritEst
By Tony | 09 Apr 2009 10:39
Surely you're joking? of course the URL list couldn't be published!
**
WM
date: Fri, 10 Apr 2009 04:22:33 -0700 (PDT)
author: Webmanager_CritEst
|
