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W3C and PICS -- from filtering to censorship?
``` [The enclosed message, forwarded by permission, is taken from a longer dialogue that was provoked by concerns from Australian civil liberties activist Roger Clarke that the publicly stated motivation for the PICS (Platform for Internet Content Selection) standard is shifting steadily from voluntary content filtering by users toward censorship by government. Roger had previously written sympathetic reports about PICS, available at http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/Regn.html#contf http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/PICS960716.html http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/W3COzConf.html I won't take a position myself, but will leave it to others to judge.]
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Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 23:51:17 +1000 From: rene@pobox.com (Irene Graham) Subject: Re: W3C is Changing Its Stripes - For The Worse
On Sat, 19 Apr 1997 09:21:15 -0700, "Simson L. Garfinkel"
That is, probably unintentionally, misleading. The -original- article by Resnick and Miller is, as far as I can find, no longer linked from the PICS web site. The original article made no mention of the potential use of PICS facilitated systems by governments, or ISPs under government threat, to censor.
May I suggest you read the actual -original- version of their document "PICS: Internet Access Controls Without Censorship" which is, as at today, still at: http://www.w3.org/pub/WWW/PICS/iacwc.htm The link from the PICS homepage to that document was changed to lead to: http://www.w3.org/pub/WWW/PICS/iacwcv2.htm sometime between 5 Apr 96 and 21 Oct 96.
I believe Roger's comments suggesting that the philosophy behind PICS has changed substantially are entirely justified, and in that regard I cite some notable differences between the two documents below:
Old: "Parents may not wish to expose their children to sexual or violent images. Businesses may want to prevent their employees from visiting recreational sites during hours of peak network usage." New: Adds another line to above para: "Governments may want to restrict reception of materials that are legal in other countries but not in their own."
Old: "Appropriateness, however is neither an objective nor a universal measure. It depends on at least three factors.=20
Old: "The coarsest intervention is to classify some materials as inappropriate and bar them entirely from certain distribution channels. For example, in the United States it is illegal to distribute obscene materials through the mail or most other channels, including computer networks. This approach does not take into account the supervisor, recipient, or context, and it gives great power to those who choose the criteria or perform the classification-- power that may be abused." New: That issue, i.e. topic of abuse of power, is not mentioned.
Old: The section on labeling vocabularies has no mention of government. New: "Governments may also mandate country-specific vocabularies."
Basically, the original document was heavily focussed on parents controlling access of minors in their care, with the occasional mention of businesses wanting to block access to recreational sites "during hours of peak network usage". The later document undoubtedly condones, perhaps encourages, PICS facilitated systems being used for censorship purposes by government and corporations.
Other reference material relative to the original promotion of PICS includes the first press release "PICS Created" of 11 Sept 95 which, although no longer linked from the PICS site press release page, is still on-line at: http://www.w3.org/pub/WWW/PICS/950911_Announce/pics-pr.html
Although PICS was originally (Sept 95) promoted as facilitating -voluntary- labelling and a -diversity- of rating systems from which the Net community could choose, it is highly questionable whether that continues to be the objective of the PICS consortium. I quote from two articles in the Australian Financial Review by David Crowe, who has written a number of well informed articles relative to PICS, which allege to include comments from Jim Miller (co-chair of PICS):
28 June 96: "...The 'veiled threat' of the US Communications Decency Act and similar laws in Australia and other countries would force Web page creators to rate their own content, he said. 'It's going to happen and the publishers are going to resist it as long as they can, but they'll have to realise that they must rate their content or face prosecution'. "
(So much for voluntary.)
18 Jul 96: "...PICS, the technology is also likely to be a key reference for a labelling task force to be established in the wake of the ABA's report into online services. But one of the creators of PICS, Dr Jim Miller of the World Wide Web Consortium, yesterday warned that any Australian adoption of PICS must match international proposals. 'It's sort of my nightmare that every country would adopt PICS but each would decide to have its own rating system,' he said. "
(So much for diversity of rating/labelling systems.)
If I was being charitable I would say that the PICS developers did not think further than the protections (sometimes) afforded to Americans by the 1st Amendment and therefore overlooked potential use of the technology in other countries.=20
If I was not being charitable, I would say the W3C folk have been outnumbered by corporate interests within the PICS consortium who stand to profit substantially from PICS facilitated blocking systems and national rating systems being mandated by governments - on national or ISP proxy servers and in libraries, schools, etc.=20
I'm being neither at this point. However, I do say that PICS was originally promoted by W3C as facilitating voluntary systems and blocking software installed on PCs -not- network servers. That publicity encouraged most of the Net community to endorse and further promote PICS. The reality of PICS development is something quite different.=20
In my opinion, those concerned about freedom of expression and the freedom of people globally to read and see what they wish, who have promoted PICS based on the original PR, are justified in having the view that they have been conned, if not betrayed.
About two years ago, anti-censorship Net advocates were saying it's impossible for any country to -effectively- censor the Net; that technology would always find a way around censorship. I can't recall anyone seriously saying that for at least 12 months and we have the W3C/PICS consortium, largely, to thank for that. It remains to be seen whether many people around the globe will soon be needing someone to find a way around the technology that is PICS.
Regards Irene
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Irene Graham, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. PGP key on h/page.
The Net Labelling Delusion:
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