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The Prime Minister’s touching belief that he can clean up the web with technology is misguided and even dangerous, says Padraig Reidy<\/p>\n
Announcing plans to clean up the internet on Monday morning, David Cameron invoked King Canute, saying he had been warned \u201cYou can as easily legislate what happens on the Internet as you can legislate the tides.\u201d<\/p>\n
The story of Canute and the sea is that the king wanted to demonstrate his own fallability to fawning fans. But David Cameron today seems to want to tell the world that he can actually eliminate everything that\u2019s bad from the web. Hence we had \u201crape porn\u201d, child abuse images, extreme pornography and the issue of what children view online all lumped together in the one speech. All will be solved, and soon, through the miracle of technology.<\/p>\n
Cameron points out that \u201cthe Internet is not a sideline to \u2018real life\u2019 or an escape from \u2018real life\u2019; it is real life.\u201d In this much he\u2019s right. But he then goes on to discuss the challenge of child abuse and rape images in almost entirely technological terms.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve written before about the cyber-utopianism inherent in the arguments of many who are pro filtering and blocking: there is an absolute faith in the ability of technology to tackle deep moral and ethical issues; witness Cameron\u2019s imploring today, telling ISPs to \u201cset their greatest minds\u201d to creating perfect filters. Not philosophers, mind, but programmers.<\/p>\n
Thus, as with so many discussions on the web, the idea that if something is technologically possible, then there is no reason not to do it, prevails. It\u2019s simply a matter of writing the right code rather than thinking about the real implications of what one is doing. This was the same thinking that led to Cameron\u2019s suggestion of curbs on social media during the riots of 2011.<\/p>\n
The Prime Minister announced that, among other things, internet service providers will be forced to provide default filters blocking sites. This is a problem both on a theoretical and practical level; theoretically as it sets up a censored web as a standard, and practically because filters are imperfect, and block much more than they are intended to. Meanwhile, tech-savvy teenagers may well be able to circumvent them, meaning parents are left with a false sense of security.<\/p>\n
The element of choice and here is key; parents should actively choose a filter, knowing what that entails, rather than passively accepting, as currently proposed by the Prime Minister. Engaging with that initial thought about what is viewed in your house could lead to greater engagement and discussion about children\u2019s web use – which is the best way to protect them.<\/p>\n