Search Engine Porn Filters
• Laws and Politicians, Mostly Bad
The American Civil Liberties Union takes a stand agains the American Justice Department’s attempt to bring back the Child Online Protection Act that the US Supreme Court ruled a violation of free speech rights.
The ACLU says the anti-porn filters protect people using the major search engines.
The study concludes that the strictest filter tested, AOL’s Mature Teen, blocked 91 percent of the sexually explicit Web sites in indexes maintained by Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp.’s MSN.
Filters with less restrictive settings blocked at least 40 percent of sexually explicit sites, according to the study of random Web sites by Philip B. Stark, a statistics professor at University of California, Berkeley.
“Filters are more than 90 percent effective, according to Stark,” ACLU attorney Chris Hansen said Tuesday during a break in the trial. “Also, with filters, it’s up to the parents how to use it, whereas COPA requires a one-solution-fits-all (approach).”
Government study: Web 1 percent porn
Will American parents ever take responsibility for their children?