A John Gilmore (probably) said, "The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it." Let it be so with drones. About a decade ago, I wrote about Smuggling USB Sticks. You can load an incredible amount of data onto flash memory and carry it just about anywhere. Nowadays, drones mean that people don't need to physically carry drives themselves. And drones can carry a lot more than data. Drones deliver abortion pills to women in Poland Drones have been used to deliver…
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I get a lot of random Twitter DMs from attractive women who are desperate to make friends with me. I usually report the obvious spammers. But a few weeks ago, one nearly slipped through the net. The woman was wearing a military uniform - a proper one, not a sexy Hallowe'en costume - and was asking a fairly sensible question of me. But something didn't sit right. Usually, these accounts have stolen photos and random names. But the name of the account matched the name on the uniform! A bit…
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Friends, allow me to wallow in a little boasting! Four years ago, I made a modest proposal for a new HTTP Code to indicate censorship. A few days ago, RFC 7725: An HTTP Status Code to Report Legal Obstacles became an approved standard by the Internet Engineering Task Force. This allows a website, proxy, or ISP to explain to the user that the resource the user requested is unavailable for legal reasons. This could be: Content which isn't permitted in a specific country. For example,…
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David Cameron wants to block certain "pornographic" search terms. He joins a long list of MPs who simply don't understand what they're talking about - like Claire Perry, Andy Burnham, and Helen Goodman. I've talked before about my time working as an "Adult Material Classifier" for Vodafone UK. In short, my team and I used to watch pornographic videos and classify whether they were suitable for inclusion on Vodafone live. There were the usual limitations (no more than two participants, all…
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The 3D printed gun is now a reality. I don't have access to a 3D printer - but I've downloaded the plans out of morbid curiosity. While downloading the blueprints may not be illegal, any UK citizen who made and owned such a handgun could face arrest, according to the UK's Metropolitan Police. BBC News It may not the best weapon in the world - it has reliability and accuracy issues - and it may not be the cheapest - around £5,000 for a 3D printer to fabricate the thing. But it's certainly the …
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I remarked earlier about Helen Goodman MP and her total lack of technical knowledge. An MP being a bit behind the times isn't the greatest shock - but she's Labour's Shadow Minister for Culture, Media, and Sport - that's a big deal! This year, Claire Perry MP produced an "independent" report into online child protection. By "independent" I mean "produced by vested interests including religious groups". It makes for pretty tedious reading, however you may get a laugh from the antics of our…
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"This Is Not A Film" by Iranian director Jafar Panahi, who is under house arrest in his country for alleged “propaganda against the regime,” will be screened under the Free Jafar Panahi Program of the 13th Cinemanila. The film was smuggled from Iran in a Flash-Drive hidden inside a cake to Cannes for screening a few months back. Manila Bulletin This is a microSD card. Currently on sale in the UK for under £14. It can hold 32GB of information. That's a little abstract, so let me break it dow…
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Two years ago I was severely annoyed at Labour's Andy Burnham for his plans to censor the net. Today, I am equally annoyed at the Conservative's Ed Vaizey for a similarly corruptible scheme. I don't have the money to lobby bribe donate to the Conservative party. I'm too scared of the police attempting to kill protesters to go and stand up for my beliefs. What can I do that will make me feel smug and self-righteous yet won't involve me having to go outside in the snow? It is, I understand,…
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I want to ignore the debate about whether it's right or wrong to "censor" books based on the sexuality of their subject matter.It doesn't matter, at this stage, whether Amzon's deranking of LGBTQI works was a glitch, policy or the work of trolls. What matters is the action taken by the "online community" and Amazon's reaction to it.Firstly, why would anyone take the word of an Amazon CSR as customer policy?I've worked in call centres - I guess a lot of people have - CSRs are almost universally…
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The UK Culture Secretary, Mr Andy Burnham, has recently suggested that we censor rate websites. With the predictable backlash.But don't blame Andy! It's not his fault. Allow me to explain...Here's some pornography for you...Phwoar! Look at the tits on that!Here's some child porn.Sickening. How could Leonardo Da Vinci bear to paint such monstrosities?My local school is putting on a play full of under-age, pre-marital sex. With foul language, wanton violence, drug abuse and teenage suicide.My…
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