>The way we protect British kids from the Internet is to make better and more capable Britons, rather than to try and kidproof the entire internet.
If only it were that easy. For me as a parent, my approach is to implement a "Great personal firewall" - that is, internet restrictions that decrease over time as they mature, and starting with essentially zero access. Unfortunately, it's probably doomed to fail as other kids their age (5 + 7) and in their peer groups are already walking around with smartphones.
To put it bluntly, too many parents are too unenaged and lazy (or self-centered).
I don't understand why the British government's solution is to impose orders on British ISPs as they have done with other websites that they want to block, rather than try to impose on a company based in another country.
I bought a 4chan pass today just to support the effort. If there's ever a hornets nest you don't want to fuck with it's 4chan and i can't imagine a better poking stick than ofcom.
I'm happy to have popups with "Reject All" button. If there is no "Reject All" button I close site immediately.
Cookie regulations are perfectly Ok, businesses which want to add 429 vendors and data processors to simple internet shop or corporate blog is not.
If you use cookies only for legitimate basic local functionality (like login and shopping cart on online shop site) you SHOULD NOT have any popups, there is exemption for such use cases in the regulations. Only if you want to sell data or pass it for processing to third party you need popup. Simply don't.
The simplest solution is to require all online devices to have a "child mode" that can be activated during setup, and require all parents to enable this for minors under 16. In this mode, the device takes screenshots every few seconds of active use, and makes this viewable on the parents' devices as a timeline. This must be private with full end-to-end encryption and limited data retention in the clients (7 days or so).
It's much simpler than blocking, and much more effective. Most parents don't know what to block proactively, blocklists are imperfect, and the biggest threats are hiding in the most innocent looking apps (Discord, Roblox, Reddit, even just messaging with friends from school).
Given the constant stream of crazy things I read about the UK, I'm surprised that a national firewall is off the table given their laws and attitudes around what would be protected speech here.
The ID side of things though? Having your citizenry send their personal information to foreign companies all across the globe? It's a disaster waiting to happen.
> The Act explicitly grants Ofcom the legal authority to regulate online safety for individuals in the United Kingdom, and this expressly includes conducting investigations into, and imposing penalties for, non-compliance by providers of online services with their duties under the Act. […] The Act expressly anticipates that it will have extra-territorial effect
I don't see anything wrong here: Sure, Ofcom can have the legal authority to regulate online safety worldwide. It's just that this... legal authority... isn't quite enforceable outside the UK jurisdiction. How unfortunate!
> It's just that this... legal authority... isn't quite enforceable outside the UK jurisdiction.
That appears to be the widely held understanding in this particular case.
I'm not so sure. This isn't a strictly black letter law matter. It probably should be, and I'd prefer that it was, but I see political angles to this.
Right now, it is improbable that Trump's DOJ has any interest in doing Ofcom's bidding in the US for UK "online safety" violations, real or imagined. But a world where the US DOJ might does exist. We're the political vectors aligned differently; say, for example, Ofcom was pursuing 4chan for "supporting" ISIS in the UK, I think few people would be surprised learn that Trump's DOJ was eager to "investigate," and perhaps synthesize some indictable offenses, and perhaps even extradite.
Have we not seen, and are we not seeing now, ample examples of similar abuses of power?
So I see much of the rhetoric, and also this lawyer's flippancy, as naïve. Given the optimal set of office holders and sufficient moral panic over some matter, Ofcom et al. could very well have real leverage in the US.
It doesn't go nearly as far as US legislation such as the trade embargoes against Cuba, Iran, or Venezuela. In that the US effectively harms any company that does business with a sanctioned country by sanctioning the company in the US. By the same logic, the UK could sanction any company that does business with 4chan and prevent it from doing any business in the UK.
I'd like for someone to do a parental rights case at the ECHR against this, e.g. by claiming that according to their religion and traditional culture kids in their teens should be getting into contact with porn, snuff and the like, and that they as parents have a right to transfer this to their kids.
It seems to me the UK isn’t all that aware of just how gone are the days of the British Empire. I can imagine the OSA being somewhat relevant internationally in the pre-handover days, but not today.
Just reading the first correspondence from Ofcom and this section in particular:
> What should I do if there is confidential information in my
response?
> You must provide all the information requested, even if you consider that the information, or any
part of it, is confidential (for example, because of its commercial sensitivity).
> If you consider that any of the information you are required to provide is confidential, you should
clearly identify the relevant information and explain in writing your reasons for considering it
confidential (for example, the reasons why you consider disclosure of the information will seriously
and prejudicially affect the interests of your business, a third party or the private affairs of an
individual. You may find it helpful to do this in a separate document marked ‘confidential
information’
> Ofcom will take into account any claims that information should be considered confidential.
However, it is for Ofcom to decide what is or is not confidential, taking into account any relevant
common law and statutory definitions. We do not accept unjustified or unsubstantiated claims of
confidentiality. Blanket claims of confidentiality covering entire documents or types of information
are also unhelpful and will rarely be accepted. For example, we would expect stakeholders to consider whether the fact of the document’s existence or particular elements of the document (e.g. its title or metadata such as to/from/date/subject or other specific content) are not confidential. You should therefore identify specific words, numbers, phrases or pieces of information you consider to be confidential. You may also find it helpful to categorise your explanations as Category A, Category B etc
> Any confidential information provided to Ofcom is subject to restrictions on its further disclosure
under the common law of confidence. In many cases, information provided to Ofcom is also subject
to statutory restrictions relating to the disclosure of that information (regardless of whether that
information is confidential information). For this reason, we do not generally consider it necessary to
sign non-disclosure agreements. Our general approach to the disclosure of information is set out
below.
> For the avoidance of doubt, you are not required to provide information that is legally privileged and
you can redact specific parts of documents that are legally privileged. However, where you withhold
information on the basis that it is privileged you should provide Ofcom with a summary of the nature
of the information and an explanation of why you consider it to be privileged. Please note that just
because an email is sent to or from a legal adviser does not mean it is necessarily a legally privileged
communication. Further information is available in paragraph 3.18 of our Online Safety Information
Powers Guidance.
So ofcom's position is:
We want your data, you will give us your data, the GDPR does not apply to you, and if it does, we will decide whether it does. You must explain yourself to us. You must not redact anything. Even if you think you can redact anything (you know, because GDPR) you cannot redact anything. The GDPR and data protection laws do not apply because we have said so. You are required to break confidentiality agreements. We will not sign an NDA because we do not need to and we will not justify ourselves to you in any way shape or form.
We are the UK, and therefore, because we asked you to, you will comply with our every demand, whim and whimper. Otherwise we will continue to send strongly worded emails.
And fine you. And block you. Because that's the only thing we can do. And you best not advertise VPN's or we'll...Send another sternly worded email!
Good job UK!
(I cannot see how that paragraph is in any way legal, it must break the EU/UK's data protection laws in trying to compel disclosure of third party data. I cannot see any court in the UK ever upholding that paragraph if legally challenged as it&#...
"The least bad thing that Ofcom and the Government could do is to quietly let the matter drop whilst focusing on education."
This generalises very well for all Government. Shame we're a couple of generations into education being about producing pliant workers over independent, thinking human beings.
> education being about producing pliant workers over independent, thinking human beings.
You cant have things like computers and smart phones if you dont have millions of pliant workers mass producing them for you. If you want the technological world that we live in to be possible then you should accept that it requires this concept. If everybody is a creative independant free thinking individual, then nobody is a worker drone in a factory churning out phones, laptops, or the materials and components that go into them.
Mass education was formed to destroy local cultures and languages in the prussian empire and revolutionary french to make sure people were compliant and wouldn't revolt against the state's control, it has never had anything to do with making people thinkers. This is the stated purpose, and always has been.
Some people see this as comedic, but government bureaucrats and politicians have always had a sucking desire for control over our lives. They will keep pushing until all of us are in strait jackets living in a nightmare.
We must resist and do everything we can to shrink government power and grow our personal rights and freedoms.
In one of the more enlightened things Elon has done in the last few years, he fought back, and he won.
Interestingly, here in AU, there was a storm of media outrage at the time, saying all kinds of nasty things about Musk, making all kinds of assertions about how he was super arrogant and wrong to insist on upholding american's freedom of speech, with no attempt to justify why. It was almost like we were just expected to assume that AU law applies everywhere on earth.
Strangely, when the court order wasn't upheld because AU laws don't actually apply outside our country, and the gubmint that was so outraged and "ready to take him on" lost badly on every point, there was no huge storm of media coverage about that.
Jokes aside, what on earth is going on with the UK?
It seems to have serious demographic issues and actual ethnic English are understandably angry at having been largely vilified as Nazis and far-right for wanting to protect their heritage and identity.
To reach into draconian surveillance and censorship to quell its own natives of the land who has lived there for thousands of years at the behest of those that have arrived from far away lands with a drastically incompatible culture with the British is a recipe for civil war.
Am I missing something here? 4chan is available in the UK so has to follow UK laws there, where is the problem? Regardless of whatever it is they are enforcing.
Ofcom does know that they're dealing with 4chan, right?
Ultimately all of these sorts of regulations rely on people feeling the need to comply. 4chan feels no needs, least of all to comply.
It's the immovable object of online forums. It has not encountered a true unstoppable force. I doubt it ever will.
If they want it "gone" they'll have to both block it at the infrastructure level leading into the country and keep people from using internet infrastructure that isn't subject to these blocks from within the UK. That's... not really possible.
I hate the Ofcom and the clowns that pass for British government.
But I can see how this argument would make sense in the retarded mind of a lawyer. The first amendment doesn't give people rights: people already have those rights. Instead, the first amendment constrains the power of the US government to infringe upon those rights. It doesn't constrain the power of any other government.
I think that because the UK speaks english, they’ve come to believe they somehow have similar levels of extraterritorial power as the US. Just a general symptom of way too many people consuming US media/political content.
There are treaties and international conventions, as well as the ICC and other supranational bodies that prosecute abuses by nation states and individuals responsible for the actions.
But, largely, that was my point - it's entirely illegal, and a "might makes right" situation.
88 comments
[ 1.9 ms ] story [ 101 ms ] threadIf only it were that easy. For me as a parent, my approach is to implement a "Great personal firewall" - that is, internet restrictions that decrease over time as they mature, and starting with essentially zero access. Unfortunately, it's probably doomed to fail as other kids their age (5 + 7) and in their peer groups are already walking around with smartphones.
To put it bluntly, too many parents are too unenaged and lazy (or self-centered).
That would seem to be least intrusive option.
Using the internet in the UK/EU is such a horrible experience, every cookie pop-up is a reminder how badly thought out these rules are.
Cookie regulations are perfectly Ok, businesses which want to add 429 vendors and data processors to simple internet shop or corporate blog is not.
If you use cookies only for legitimate basic local functionality (like login and shopping cart on online shop site) you SHOULD NOT have any popups, there is exemption for such use cases in the regulations. Only if you want to sell data or pass it for processing to third party you need popup. Simply don't.
It's much simpler than blocking, and much more effective. Most parents don't know what to block proactively, blocklists are imperfect, and the biggest threats are hiding in the most innocent looking apps (Discord, Roblox, Reddit, even just messaging with friends from school).
The ID side of things though? Having your citizenry send their personal information to foreign companies all across the globe? It's a disaster waiting to happen.
I don't see anything wrong here: Sure, Ofcom can have the legal authority to regulate online safety worldwide. It's just that this... legal authority... isn't quite enforceable outside the UK jurisdiction. How unfortunate!
That appears to be the widely held understanding in this particular case.
I'm not so sure. This isn't a strictly black letter law matter. It probably should be, and I'd prefer that it was, but I see political angles to this.
Right now, it is improbable that Trump's DOJ has any interest in doing Ofcom's bidding in the US for UK "online safety" violations, real or imagined. But a world where the US DOJ might does exist. We're the political vectors aligned differently; say, for example, Ofcom was pursuing 4chan for "supporting" ISIS in the UK, I think few people would be surprised learn that Trump's DOJ was eager to "investigate," and perhaps synthesize some indictable offenses, and perhaps even extradite.
Have we not seen, and are we not seeing now, ample examples of similar abuses of power?
So I see much of the rhetoric, and also this lawyer's flippancy, as naïve. Given the optimal set of office holders and sufficient moral panic over some matter, Ofcom et al. could very well have real leverage in the US.
> What should I do if there is confidential information in my response?
> You must provide all the information requested, even if you consider that the information, or any part of it, is confidential (for example, because of its commercial sensitivity).
> If you consider that any of the information you are required to provide is confidential, you should clearly identify the relevant information and explain in writing your reasons for considering it confidential (for example, the reasons why you consider disclosure of the information will seriously and prejudicially affect the interests of your business, a third party or the private affairs of an individual. You may find it helpful to do this in a separate document marked ‘confidential information’
> Ofcom will take into account any claims that information should be considered confidential. However, it is for Ofcom to decide what is or is not confidential, taking into account any relevant common law and statutory definitions. We do not accept unjustified or unsubstantiated claims of confidentiality. Blanket claims of confidentiality covering entire documents or types of information are also unhelpful and will rarely be accepted. For example, we would expect stakeholders to consider whether the fact of the document’s existence or particular elements of the document (e.g. its title or metadata such as to/from/date/subject or other specific content) are not confidential. You should therefore identify specific words, numbers, phrases or pieces of information you consider to be confidential. You may also find it helpful to categorise your explanations as Category A, Category B etc
> Any confidential information provided to Ofcom is subject to restrictions on its further disclosure under the common law of confidence. In many cases, information provided to Ofcom is also subject to statutory restrictions relating to the disclosure of that information (regardless of whether that information is confidential information). For this reason, we do not generally consider it necessary to sign non-disclosure agreements. Our general approach to the disclosure of information is set out below.
> For the avoidance of doubt, you are not required to provide information that is legally privileged and you can redact specific parts of documents that are legally privileged. However, where you withhold information on the basis that it is privileged you should provide Ofcom with a summary of the nature of the information and an explanation of why you consider it to be privileged. Please note that just because an email is sent to or from a legal adviser does not mean it is necessarily a legally privileged communication. Further information is available in paragraph 3.18 of our Online Safety Information Powers Guidance.
So ofcom's position is:
We want your data, you will give us your data, the GDPR does not apply to you, and if it does, we will decide whether it does. You must explain yourself to us. You must not redact anything. Even if you think you can redact anything (you know, because GDPR) you cannot redact anything. The GDPR and data protection laws do not apply because we have said so. You are required to break confidentiality agreements. We will not sign an NDA because we do not need to and we will not justify ourselves to you in any way shape or form.
We are the UK, and therefore, because we asked you to, you will comply with our every demand, whim and whimper. Otherwise we will continue to send strongly worded emails.
And fine you. And block you. Because that's the only thing we can do. And you best not advertise VPN's or we'll...Send another sternly worded email!
Good job UK!
(I cannot see how that paragraph is in any way legal, it must break the EU/UK's data protection laws in trying to compel disclosure of third party data. I cannot see any court in the UK ever upholding that paragraph if legally challenged as it&#...
This generalises very well for all Government. Shame we're a couple of generations into education being about producing pliant workers over independent, thinking human beings.
You cant have things like computers and smart phones if you dont have millions of pliant workers mass producing them for you. If you want the technological world that we live in to be possible then you should accept that it requires this concept. If everybody is a creative independant free thinking individual, then nobody is a worker drone in a factory churning out phones, laptops, or the materials and components that go into them.
We must resist and do everything we can to shrink government power and grow our personal rights and freedoms.
In one of the more enlightened things Elon has done in the last few years, he fought back, and he won.
Interestingly, here in AU, there was a storm of media outrage at the time, saying all kinds of nasty things about Musk, making all kinds of assertions about how he was super arrogant and wrong to insist on upholding american's freedom of speech, with no attempt to justify why. It was almost like we were just expected to assume that AU law applies everywhere on earth.
Here's a fun sample of a totally unbiased article from the time: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-04-20/elon-musk-reacts-to-e...
Strangely, when the court order wasn't upheld because AU laws don't actually apply outside our country, and the gubmint that was so outraged and "ready to take him on" lost badly on every point, there was no huge storm of media coverage about that.
It seems to have serious demographic issues and actual ethnic English are understandably angry at having been largely vilified as Nazis and far-right for wanting to protect their heritage and identity.
To reach into draconian surveillance and censorship to quell its own natives of the land who has lived there for thousands of years at the behest of those that have arrived from far away lands with a drastically incompatible culture with the British is a recipe for civil war.
Ultimately all of these sorts of regulations rely on people feeling the need to comply. 4chan feels no needs, least of all to comply.
It's the immovable object of online forums. It has not encountered a true unstoppable force. I doubt it ever will.
If they want it "gone" they'll have to both block it at the infrastructure level leading into the country and keep people from using internet infrastructure that isn't subject to these blocks from within the UK. That's... not really possible.
But I can see how this argument would make sense in the retarded mind of a lawyer. The first amendment doesn't give people rights: people already have those rights. Instead, the first amendment constrains the power of the US government to infringe upon those rights. It doesn't constrain the power of any other government.
But, largely, that was my point - it's entirely illegal, and a "might makes right" situation.
Publically available databases suggest 4chan executives include John Cena, Evan Essence and Norton Antivenom.
1. Tell 4chan or its registrar l to take down .co.uk urls (maybe?)
2. Tell UK ISPs to ban UK visitors from viewing 4chan
Too bad the UK public can't effectively tell Ofcom off.