back to article Library web filtering removes info access for vulnerable, says shushing collective

Poor implementation of internet-filtering policies in the UK's public libraries has damaged public access to exactly the kind of information local library computers are intended to provide, according to a just-released batch of data from a collection of library professionals. Despite the possibility for filtering to be …

  1. This post has been deleted by its author

    1. Graham Marsden
      Boffin

      @1980s_coder

      If you only have access to a small local library, there may not *be* books on the subjects you want (or those books may be 20 years out of date).

      There's an awful lot more information out there on the internet and it's much easier to search through it and find the bits that are actually relevant to what you want to know.

      And if you find information "offensive" or "dangerous", don't look at it!

    2. MacroRodent

      Blunt instrument

      A major problem is that there is no intelligent filtering software. Filter words, and you will censor pages with innocent words with "naughty" sub-strings, or foreign words (like the Swedish for "six"). Filter by domain names , and you are at the mercy of whoever decides the blacklist (and these people generally seem to be incapable of distinguishing between pórn and proper information about séxual issues).

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      I agree it's always a judgement call between protection and damage. I'd say that the judgement call to block websites like LGBT is always a wrong one.

      .... and although you are no doubt joking, if you're looking up current information about abortion such as local services and current discussion etc., one of those "book" things might not necessarily be the best place to look.

  2. Marvin O'Gravel Balloon Face
    Black Helicopters

    The first rule about the Radical Librarians Collective...

    ... is that you don't talk about the Radical Librarians Collective.

  3. JimmyPage Silver badge
    FAIL

    For some reason, I thought of Blackadder ...

    J: Ah, I see you've underlined a few (takes dictionary, reads): `bloomers';

    `bottom'; `burp'; (turns a page) `fart'; `fiddle'; `fornicate'?

    G: Well...

    J: Sir! I hope you're not using the first English dictionary to look up

    rude words!

    E: I wouldn't be too hopeful; that's what all the other ones will be

    used for.

  4. Ole Juul
    Coat

    Time to teach the kids (and councils) some IT.

    some councils involved in six-figure contracts to support web-blocking over multi-year periods.

    Perhaps the council could also employ another six-figure contractor to have a VPN installed to fix the first problem.

  5. Ole Juul
    Mushroom

    are news sites blocked?

    Holy god! This Irish Catholic sex-ed video . . . RT questions more.

    1. Teiwaz
      Facepalm

      Re: are news sites blocked?

      Reminded me of the Goodies Gender Education episode. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1-HpnD0-4o

      (the whole topic, not just the catholic sex ed vid.)

      I went to a protestant school in Ireland, their sex ed. was almost as incomprehensible...

  6. chivo243 Silver badge
    Boffin

    What about the unseen stuff?

    I have no problem opening the content filter to allow a site. I could care less about the content, but I do care about the unseen payloads some sites "offer". When the content filter or firewall says the website is a C&C node etc., no way will it be opened.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So libraries are collectively making gay people suffer and this is assumed to be accidental?

    How things have changed.

  8. Paul Crawford Silver badge
    Unhappy

    So. Fscking. Predictable.

  9. John Lilburne

    "Library users should not be denied access to sites that contain information about, for example, abortion, sex education and LGBT issues, but many people will be reluctant to make libraries aware of this when it happens,"

    What is wrong with the modern day equivalent of the playground, and behind the bike shed, for learning such things (wikipedia)?

  10. emilyw

    I'm quite disappointed that you've gone for "shushing collective" in the title of this article. Not least because "shushing" is not at all what librarians are trying to do here. Please don't resort to lazy stereotypes next time you write about librarians.

    1. Teiwaz

      Good point, but stereotypes are just politically incorrect archetypes.

      In this case, the 'shushing' is any moans from recreational access of 'information' which also possibly preventing those from seeking personal issues information that has been categorised in the same vein.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    One researcher, known to Smith, was investigating female genital mutilation (FGM) but found that the sites they were attempting to access had been blocked as they contained sexual content. Smith told us:

    And when a kid see a picture of a clitoris being cut off and close up images of the vagina...in a PUBLIC place, others will be the shouting their mouths off.

    Dammed if they do, dammed if they don't.

    1. Lusty

      Nonsense. Libraries have had photographs of vaginas in them in various categories of book, magazine and microfilm for decades. All of these have been viewable without complaint within the library without issue. The problem is that people suddenly get excited because it's on a computer. The primary reason these people get excited, by the way, is that the marketing material of the filtering companies tells them they should get excited. The secondary reason, is that the bar for entry as a computing "professional" was installed beneath the carpet, and organisations such as the BCS are total failures when it comes to maintaining standards in the profession.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        "[...] book, magazine and microfilm for decades. All of these have been viewable without complaint within the library without issue."

        There do appear to be different legal rules for digital and book pictures. The police prosecute people for having a picture on their computer storage - which is merely a scan of a page in a book from W H Smith.

        View the picture on a web page and you are judged guilty of making an indecent image. Buy the book from a reputable high street shop and it is legal. However the police can use it as a lever to justify searching your computer - and for the prosecution's pitch to a jury to make a weak case look more plausible by volume.

  12. Doctor_Wibble
    Big Brother

    Safety for the vulnerable?

    Is giving a 'vulnerable person' (horribly wide definition) open access to the web always a good idea? This then potentially makes them even more vulnerable either to scammers or even any other predatory types wanting to take advantage and given that it's the internet you can guarantee that someone concerned about their odd liking for chewing used cat litter will suddenly discover that it's completely normal and there's a thriving worldwide community (etc).

    It comes down to the question of who is being protected, and from what, and why, though I do understand the librarians' concerns - personally I would say the protection of the public access to the internet is the priority and with protective filters (sites with particular content/phrases are more likely to get you pwned) there will inevitably be collateral damage, unfortunate but not unexpected.

    1. Teiwaz

      Re: Safety for the vulnerable?

      "someone concerned about their odd liking for chewing used cat litter** will suddenly discover that it's completely normal and there's a thriving worldwide community* (etc)."

      * Is there?

      ** (I do like a pointlessly ridiculous graphic example though).

      1. Doctor_Wibble
        Boffin

        Re: Safety for the vulnerable?

        > (I do like a pointlessly ridiculous graphic example though)

        Merely an attempt to make sure it was so far 'out there' as an unwise and personally dangerous pastime so as not to be mistaken as meaning anything else, and the sort of thing which would normally have enough real-world people advising against it.

        I didn't see any figures for how many web access attempts were blocked, which might give a better appreciation of the actual scale of the problem rather than speculating that the group of frustrated teenagers in the corner are looking for help with complex personal issues.

        And on that note, perhaps some of the blocking/censorship is a result of which way the computer screens are facing... public computer, public place (? or 'open to public', whichever), compromises are inevitable when deciding whose choice counts.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Safety for the vulnerable?

      You can't win. Keep them off the internet and you harm them, let them on the internet and you harm them. It's almost like allowing people to make their own decisions is going to be a realistic choice.

  13. birdie
    Meh

    If you could not refer to us as a 'shushing collective' given we're the opposite of that, that would be grand!

    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge
      Happy

      Yeah, it's bloody noisy in libraries these days, what with all the childrens activities and story-times etc.

  14. Alistair
    Windows

    Censorismship

    To the dear librarian:

    Please, don't worry, the 'shushing collective' commentary is not meant in any derogatory manner, it is meant far more as a nod to all the horrible stereotypes that exist in the collective concious. The form is quite common on this site, and if anything is designed to point out that librarians just aren't like that.

    Censorship is Censorship. It is without a doubt going to run roughshod over knowledge of any sort. And I'm quite willing to bet long odds that there are council types over there that are trying to get even more strict filters applied to the library firewalls/filtering tools as fast as they can, given that idiots in power will apply their personal agendas left right and centre.

    Given the size of the task at hand, and the point from Lost-all-faith, it will be near on impossible to have functional filtering rules without hitting some botherer or other's buttons. Over here the libraries have filtering rules and there is a reasonably anonymous method of requesting that the filter be lifted, (tain't perfect, but the old slip 'o paper in a box works as needed) as well as an automated method of submitting the request from the blocker splash itself.

    Suggesting that OMG there are BOOKS around, go read 'em is relevant, yes, but the issue with those dead trees is that it takes TIME to get from the thought bubble to the printed page, and the interwebz has given us the ability to shorten that time. Thus information on line may well be somewhat more current and relevant than the stuff in the dead trees.

    (Mind you it has yet to be seen if the shortening of publication cycle is necessarily an improvement, since it seems the first victim has been spelling, and the second victim was likely logical thought.)

    1. Vic

      Re: Censorismship

      Mind you it has yet to be seen if the shortening of publication cycle is necessarily an improvement, since it seems the first victim has been spelling, and the second victim was likely logical thought

      I think you might have those two in the wrong order...

      Vic.

      1. Alistair
        Windows

        Re: Censorismship

        @ Vic,

        I'll concede the order may well be incorrect.

        I suspect that if we configured digital systems such that if one was posting something somewhere, it could be reviewed for spelling and cause serious physical harm to the poster when there were sufficient spelling errors present, this might slow some of the morons down, and thus improve the overall process of thought, logical or not.

  15. frank ly

    There's a lot of it about

    "... likely included as a "sub-category of sexual content", ..."

    Wikipedia has some 'sexual content'. Do they block that as well?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: There's a lot of it about

      "Wikipedia has some 'sexual content'. Do they block that as well?"

      Only when it has an entry with the picture of a record cover.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Watch_Foundation_and_Wikipedia

  16. Rich 11

    Local authorities "really do need to sit down and consider how paternalistic they're being by preventing access to these categories of information," said Smith.

    Some local authorities will be overjoyed at the good news.

    (Yes, you can read that out loud in an Ian Paisley voice if you like.)

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "[...] in an Ian Paisley voice [...]"

      Or David Cameron, Theresa May and several high profile Labour politicians. Plus just about anyone in the higher echelons of the major UK Churches.

  17. msknight
    FAIL

    I call bullshit...

    I bet these libraries contain copies of "50 Shades".

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I call bullshit...

      "[...] "50 Shades"."

      "Story of O"

      "Justine"

      "120 Days of Sodom"

      "The Bible"

      "Picture Book of Saints" by Reverend Lawrence G. Lovasik

      http://www.rookiemag.com/2013/01/literally-the-worst-thing-ever-picture-book-of-saints/

  18. This post has been deleted by its author

  19. Blipvert
    Facepalm

    For The Record

    I tried getting onto The Register using Manchester Central Libraries computers. Before the botched refit of the library this wasn't a problem. After the refit your site was blocked! The message said something about the site being unsuitable as it had links to copyright infringing material!

    Haven't used their computers since.

  20. runyod

    For USA public libraries, any Internet Filtering not recommended

    1st Amendment impacts here. As tested up through the Supreme Court, USA public libraries tend not to use internet filtering (local jurisdictions choose): http://www.ala.org/Template.cfm?Section=IF_Resolutions&Template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=13090

  21. Why Not?

    Well if they have blocked gambling & Porn at least the LGBT etc communities will now be able to get on the computers in the library.

    There seems to be no thought to any neighboring user in her 80s who might be surfing a cookery site for the first time.

    Not sure I would want to investigate goat porn in the Library or the library would want me to. Sometimes you can't please everyone whatever their fancy.

    I realise people need access to websites for more information in some cases but I would have thought the smart phone with ubiquitous web access would suffice. You can pick up a PAYG for <£40 or use the iPhone on £40 a month contract everyone seems to have.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "[...] the iPhone on £40 a month contract everyone seems to have."

      Many adults in the UK scrape by with no spare cash. They can't afford smart phones or broadband. They are often the people who are unaware of their rights or the assistance available to them.

      Some children with the need to know about LGBT issues can be from homes where television or the internet are tools of The Devil. There are parents would not tolerate a "contaminated" child who appeared to question their religion's proscriptions.

    2. Graham Cobb Silver badge

      But the mobile phone companies' block lists are even worse!

      https://www.blocked.org.uk/

  22. Mike 16

    About those books

    I got a great deal of useful information on pyrotechnics from the (paper) Encyclopaedia Britannica back in the 1960s. It may still be available in some of the older, smaller libraries. Info on the web is very likely to be incorrect, either deliberately (note the different recipes for napalm in the book and movie versions of 'Fight Club') or from not giving a damn.

    Further, a kid browsing an encyclopaedia in a reading room is less likely to be automatically put on some watch list.

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