{"id":93195,"date":"2011-02-22T13:56:08","date_gmt":"2011-02-22T13:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.indexoncensorship.org\/?p=4658"},"modified":"2017-11-09T14:55:31","modified_gmt":"2017-11-09T14:55:31","slug":"thousands-of-websites-blocked-in-us-child-porn-bungle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/?p=93195","title":{"rendered":"Thousands of websites blocked in US child porn bungle"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The US Department of Homeland Security last Friday accidentally shut down 84,000 websites &#8212; most of them the domains of private individuals and small businesses &#8212; during a mangled operation to seize several child pornography outlets. The gaffe took <a href=\"http:\/\/freedns.afraid.org\/news\/\">several days to fix<\/a>, during which time the affected pages were redirected to a menacing warning that their domains had been seized as part of a Homeland Security investigation.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAdvertisement, distribution, transportation, receipt, and possession of child pornography constitute federal crimes that carry penalties for first time offenders of up to 30 years in federal prison, a $250,000 fine, forfeiture and restitution,\u201d the banner broadcast, wrongly associating thousands of law-abiding web users with child pornography.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.dailytech.com\/nimage\/18692_large_DHS_ICE_Takedown_Banner.jpg\" alt=\"takedown banner\" align=\"right\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Their sites are all back up now, and Homeland Security has gone on to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dhs.gov\/ynews\/releases\/pr_1297804574965.shtm\">announce and celebrate<\/a> the seizure of the 10 pornography domains it meant to target in the first place. But the error suggests how easily &#8212; and accidentally &#8211;\u2013 innocent Internet users can get caught up in the hunt for actual cyber criminals.<\/p>\n<p>The incident has also alarmed civil liberties groups <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thenewamerican.com\/index.php\/tech-mainmenu-30\/computers\/6397-does-the-us-have-an-internet-qkill-switchq\">already wary<\/a> of proposed <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wired.com\/threatlevel\/2011\/01\/kill-switch-legislation\/\">Internet \u201ckill switch\u201d legislation<\/a> in the US Senate, and the collateral damage that could come from giving government <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.ajc.com\/bob-barr-blog\/2011\/02\/18\/feds-shut-84000-websites-by-mistake\/?cxntfid=blogs_bob_barr_blog\">too much control<\/a> over cyber space. Homeland Security, meanwhile, has been conspicuously silent about the mistake.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Emily Badger<\/strong>: Thousands of websites blocked in child porn bungle<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":530,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[4883,1],"tags":[14166,14167,566],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93195"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/530"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=93195"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93195\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":94590,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93195\/revisions\/94590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=93195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=93195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.indexoncensorship.org\/newsite02may\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=93195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}