Computer underground Digest Wed Oct 23, 1996 Volume 8 : Issue 75 ISSN 1004-042X Editor: Jim Thomas (cudigest@sun.soci.niu.edu) News Editor: Gordon Meyer (gmeyer@sun.soci.niu.edu) Archivist: Brendan Kehoe Shadow Master: Stanton McCandlish Field Agent Extraordinaire: David Smith Shadow-Archivists: Dan Carosone / Paul Southworth Ralph Sims / Jyrki Kuoppala Ian Dickinson Cu Digest Homepage: http://www.soci.niu.edu/~cudigest CONTENTS, #8.75 (Wed, Oct 23, 1996) File 1--EU Net-regs; Spanish child porn; Online restraining orders File 2--Japan's Justice Ministry pushes wiretap, trashing the Const File 3--Net-censorship reports from Burma, Israel, Singapore, Jordan File 4--Singapore struggles to control cyberspace, from HKStandard File 5--Net-freedom roundup: Algiers, Malaysia, Burma, Hong Kong... File 6--Cu Digest Header Info (unchanged since 7 Apr, 1996) CuD ADMINISTRATIVE, EDITORIAL, AND SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION ApPEARS IN THE CONCLUDING FILE AT THE END OF EACH ISSUE. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 16 Oct 1996 19:29:17 -0500 From: Declan McCullagh Subject: File 1--EU Net-regs; Spanish child porn; Online restraining orders From -- fight-censorship@vorlon.mit.edu [My global net-censorship roundup is at http://www.eff.org/~declan/global/ --Declan] ************* BRUSSELS, Belgium, Oct. 16 (UPI) -- The executive Commission of the European Union proposed short- and long-term measures Wednesday to tackle the growing problem of "harmful and illegal" material disseminated on the Internet. "It's not a question of changing the Internet, but we have to do something," said EU Industry Commissioner Martin Bangemann of Germany. "If we do nothing at all -- we've had all these cases of child pornography and also information about how to make atomic weapons -- given that, we do have to react." The short-term measures contained in a Commission "communication" represented a range of policy proposals to be considered by the 15 member states. The long-term approach was couched in the form of a "green paper," a call for open debate on the matter among governments, industry and individuals, leading to possible directives or regulations at the European level. Both documents advocate closer cooperation between member states; the use of filtering software and rating systems by the end user; and the encouragement of industry self-regulation and a "code of conduct" among Internet access providers. [...] The Commission was asked to prepare preliminary proposals by the member states during the Sept. 28 council of the 15 telecommunications ministers. Responses to the green paper are due by Feb. 28, 1997, with possible new legislation on industry self-regulation by mid-1997. [...] Germany is prepared to host a ministerial-level meeting on the subject by the G-7 industrialized nations sometime next year, Bangemann said. *************** MADRID, Oct. 11 (UPI) -- Spanish police claimed Friday to have broken up the world's most extensive electronic child pornography ring using the Internet by arresting two engineering students in the northeastern town of Vic. "We have approximately 4,000 computer files containing pornographic pictures and video images, almost all of it involving children," a police spokesman in the nearby city of Barcelona said. "The images are of children as young as 3 or 4 years old who, either with other children or with adults, are practising all kinds of sexual acts including sodomy, sado-masochism and torture," the spokesman said. They said there was evidence the material was distributed to buyers in the United States, Canada and Australia. Spanish police were tipped off by investigators at the U.S. Treasury Department, who came across an Internet site where the two students stored the child pornography. It took four months to track down the students. [...] Police said the students were unlikely to spend much, if any, time in jail. Under Spanish law it is not illegal to possess child pornography and the two students face a maximum prison sentence of 10 months for its distribution. [...] **************** http://www.nando.net/newsroom/ntn/info/101796/info5_28922.html DALLAS (Oct 17, 1996 00:13 a.m. EDT) -- When someone began declaring on the Internet that Teresa Maynard was unfaithful to her husband and had her breasts surgically enhanced, the couple was angry. Anger turned to fear when the online writer added: "By the way, I have a .45 too." On Monday, a judge issued a temporary restraining order that breaks new ground in barring someone from using the Internet to transmit certain types of speech. It also was unusual for the way it was served -- it was posted on the Internet. District Judge Joe B. Brown ordered Kevin Massey to stop transmitting via the Internet "embarrassing private information concerning the Maynards." [...] But he "wholeheartedly, 100 percent" disputes that there was anything threatening about the messages. He claims he was just responding to others online with the same kind of sarcastic language that is used on the Internet all the time. As an example, he cited the tag line he uses to sign all his computer messages: "Lord, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. The courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to hide the bodies of the people I had to kill because they p------ me off." For his part, Robert Maynard said he and his wife and company have been harassed and taunted since September in a Dallas-area Internet newsgroup that serves his employees, customers and potential customers. "His first round out of the gate was to accuse my wife of sleeping with our employees like it was some kind of corporate benefit," Maynard said. "He accused her of having plastic surgery, breast surgery. [...] Kenneth Biermacher, a Dallas attorney representing the Maynards, said when the postings turned to threats, Massey crossed the line of free speech. "This speech is not protected by the First Amendment," Biermacher said. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Oct 1996 05:42:00 -0700 From: Gohsuke Takama Subject: File 2--Japan's Justice Ministry pushes wiretap, trashing the Const From--fight-censorship@vorlon.mit.edu Japan's Justice Ministry pushes wiretap, trashing the constitution "Article 21 of the Constitution of Japan Freedom of assembly and association as well as speech, press and all other forms of expression are guaranteed. 2) No censorship shall be maintained, nor shall the secrecy of any means of communication be violated. " Analyst of Japanese culture might say Japanese has "Tatemae/Hon-ne" double standard but it might be more than double. Japanese government often treats own constitution as imported cosmetics, not a base of the society and the law. On Oct 8, Japan's Justice Ministry announced they are going to propose a bill that makes wiretap of communications legal which includes the Internet and BBSs as well as telephones, is a slap to the constitution. JM stressed it will prevent organized crimes, some may point out incident of a religious cult Aum Shinrikyo which blasted nerve gas in Tokyo's subway system in March 1995 was a tailwind. But unlike USA, Freedom Of Information Act isn't here yet for national level. If law enforcement abuses wiretapping, here are no monitoring entity, no CDT, no EFF, no EPIC, no VTW. Yet another example of how Japan's police is creative about interpreting the law appeared one week before JM's announce. On Sep 30, Police of Hiroshima filed prosecution on board members of local Internet Service Provider "Urban Ecology" contributing to public exposure of pornography through their web site, provided by some user. But the thing is the user just set links to other site that contains pornographic material and it was even not linked to top page of the ISP's. This is totally an extensive understanding of current law, critics points out. The ISP already manifested against this using their web page (http://www.urban.or.jp/ub/uin.html). Still the timing of JM announce was interesting because it was in the middle of Japan's senate election campaign hell, also right after OECD in Paris. Why is it now? Setting up key escrow behind smoke screen or preparing for the return of fascisms? Gohsuke Takama )))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))) Gohsuke Takama gt@twics.com current location: Tokyo (((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((( <>Article 21 of the Constitution of Japan<> Freedom of assembly and association as well as speech, press and all other forms of expression are guaranteed. 2) No censorship shall be maintained, nor shall the secrecy of any means of communication be violated. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 7 Oct 1996 21:16:16 -0700 (PDT) From: Declan McCullagh Subject: File 3--Net-censorship reports from Burma, Israel, Singapore, Jordan [My global roundup is at http://www.eff.org/~declan/global/ --Declan] ********* INTERNET SUPPRESSION IN BURMA In an attack on the country's political dissidents, the military regime in Burma has outlawed the unauthorized possession of a computer with networking capability, and prison terms of 7 to 15 years in prison may be imposed on those who evade the law or who are found guilty of using a computer to send or receive information on such topics as state security, the economy and national culture. (Financial Times 5 Oct 96) ********** [Thanks to Joe Shea for this. --Declan] > Palestinians accuse Israel of blocking Internet access > > RAMALLAH, West Bank, Oct 7 - The Palestinian information ministry > accused Israel on Monday of blocking service to the Internet for Palestinians > during the flare-up of violence in the territories late last month. > The ministry said in a statement that Israeli authorities "instructed > Bezeq, the Israeli state telephone company, to cut off the territories to > prevent access to the Internet." > It said Palestinians had been using the Internet to "inform the world of > Israel's illegal activities in Jerusalem," which "Israel did not approve of > and did not want the world to see, so they cut off access to the Net." > The statement cited disruptions in service to Palestinians throughout the > violence in late September, sparked by the opening of a controversial tunnel > in Jerusalem's Old City. > Bezeq, whose telephone lines are used in the territories as in Israel > itself to access the Internet, denied the charges, saying it "does not supply > Internet services and therefore cannot cut them off." > A spokesman for the company, quoted by the daily Jerusalem Post, said > Palestinian users experienced problems because an Arab Internet supplier in > East Jerusalem had had "difficulties" with its phone line. > Bezeq "went to the site to fix the breakdown and offered the company > back-up lines in case of another," the spokesman said. ************* SINGAPORE, Oct. 7 (UPI) -- Singapore's strict measures to police the Internet may need to be reviewed, the chairman of a new goverment- appointed advisory committee said Monday. Many computer users in the tightly controlled island republic have expressed alarm over new laws aimed at screening out Internet pornography and monitoring Singaporeans' political discussions on the worldwide network. ``From our point of view, the regulations that are in place now are not cast in stone,'' said Bernard Tan, dean of the science faculty at the National University of Singapore and chairman of the National Internet Advisory Committee. ``One of the main aims of the committee will be to look at the way the regulations affect Internet usage and whether there are legitimate concerns,'' Tan added. ``If there is a need to do so, we want to fine- tune such regulations.'' [...] *********** Linkname: The Netizen - Global Network URL: http://www.netizen.com/netizen/96/39/index0a.html HotWired, The Netizen Jordan Rules by Vince Beiser New York City, 22 September Most regimes in the Middle East work diligently to hobble free speech; but the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan has granted unfettered debate and public inquiry a new toehold - in cyberspace. Since this past April - when a Jordanian online service, NETS, convinced Prime Minister Abdul Karim al-Kabariti to participate in an online forum - the Jordanian government has been ostensibly accountable to Jordanians. Dubbed "Ask the Government," the forum allows subscribers to address questions directly to the prime minister's office, providing an unprecedented opportunity for users to query officials on issues as conventional as water policy and as controversial as governmental corruption. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 17 Oct 1996 19:27:19 -0700 (PDT) From: Declan McCullagh Subject: File 4--Singapore struggles to control cyberspace, from HKStandard from -- fight-censorship@vorlon.mit.edu More at http://www.eff.org/~declan/global/ --Declan _________________________________________________________________ Singapore struggles to control cyberspace SINGAPORE: Singapore, famous for its social order and regulation, is struggling to control the chaos of the Internet. Determined to make the tiny city-state ``an information hub'', in the words of Information and Arts Minister George Yeo, Singapore is linking every household through a vast network of high capacity coaxial cables and super-computers. Once completed, access to the global computer network will be 1,000 times faster than through normal telephone connections. Over 150,000 of Singapore's 750,000 households are already on line and all three million people should be tied in by 1999. But with this information revolution comes new challenges, testing Singapore's famous social order, which has been carefully cultivated by the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) since the country's independence in 1965. Long used to a strictly controlled local press and restrictions on many foreign publications, Singaporeans suddenly have virtually open access to news, information, films and, most worrying to the authorities, pornography. This was not the what the government had in mind. ``We want businessmen to invest in the Internet and develop new software,'' Mr Yeo said in recent interview. ``We want the department stores and the purveyors of goods and services to make most use of the Internet.'' Worried by lack of control, Singapore has announced measures to try to curb local access to ``undesireable'' Internet sites. The Singapore Broadcasting Authority (SBA) licences just three Internet Service Providers (ISPs) for domestic subscribers, all units of government-linked companies, including state telephone company Singapore Telecom. All three have installed ``proxy servers'', giant computers capable of blocking sites the SBA wants banned. Singapore-based groups wanting to produce pages for the Internet's most popular forum, the World Wide Web, must also register with the SBA and can expect careful vetting if they trespass into the political or religious arena. But the anarchic Internet, which lacks any central authority, appears to be defeating most attempts at control. ``It is impossible to block every site,'' said Ong Su Mann, editor of the Singapore edition of Asia Online magazine. ``Some adult sites have been blocked _ Playboy, for example _ but if you are someone that seeks out adult sites, all you need to do is use a search engine (software search device) such as Yahoo! or Infoseek and type in a word like `sex' or 'nudity','' he said. A recent key-word search in Singapore for sites with ``sex'' in the title found 22,797 responses, many offering free access to pornographic pictures, videos or interactive chat-lines. A similar search for ``nudity'' found 88,100 sites. The biggest problem for would-be regulators is the Internet's size. With worldwide connections fast approaching 100 million, and new users coming in by tens of thousands every day, there are simply too many sites to police. Even if authorities were able to monitor and shut down offensive sites as fast as they appeared, users could simply dodge local controls by dialing into an Internet node in another country at international phone rates that are falling fast. Faced with these hurdles, the Singapore authorities have decided to pick off what they say are the worst sites with ``mass impact'' at source, while attempting to curb access to pornography by encouraging control at a local level. SBA chief executive officer Goh Liang Kwang says it has banned ``just a few dozen sites'', all of them pornographic. ``We want parents and teachers to put in their own measures like desk-top software such as `SurfWatch' and `Net Nanny','' Mr Goh told Reuters in an interview. Knowing it cannot block the overwhelming majority of sites on the Internet it dislikes and realising it is impractical to interfere with key-word searches, the SBA is making a gesture, which it hopes Singaporeans will respond to, Mr Goh says. On a political level, the governing PAP has set up its own Internet sites to counter ``misinformation'' about Singapore. But opponents of censorship scent victory. ``There is already plenty of censorship in Singapore,'' said Alex Chacko, publisher of several books about Singapore life which he says have incurred official displeasure. ``We've had problems in the past getting reviewed in Singapore ... Now we use the Internet.'' _ Reuter [1]Asia/Pacific References 1. http://www.hkstandard.com/online/news/001/asia/asia.htm#8 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 3 Oct 1996 05:59:08 -0700 (PDT) From: Declan McCullagh Subject: File 5--Net-freedom roundup: Algiers, Malaysia, Burma, Hong Kong... [Update on situations in Algiers, Malaysia, Burma, Singapore, European Union, U.K., Hong Kong, China, and Germany. More at http://www.eff.org/~declan/global/ --Declan] ******** SUSPENDED ALGERIAN DAILY OFFERED INTERNET PAGE Copyright 1996 Reuter Information Service PARIS (Sep 30, 1996 1:24 p.m. EDT) - A press freedom watchdog on Monday offered the suspended Algerian daily La Tribune a page on its Internet site to give it an airing during the six-month ban. "Thanks to this initiative, these journalists, banned from writing by the Algerian authorities, will be able to practice their trade again," the Paris-based Reporters without Borders (RsF) said. An Algiers court suspended La Tribune for six months on September 3 over a cartoon mocking the Algerian flag. [...] Fifty-seven journalists have been murdered by suspected rebels. RsF said authorities had suspended or seized newspapers on 55 occasions and 23 journalists had been held for more than 48 hours since the conflict broke out over the 1992 cancellation of a general election fundamentalists were poised to win. ******** UNITED NATIONS, Sept 27 (Reuter) - Malaysia's prime minister accused the West on Friday of spreading smut and violence, particularly on the Internet. In his speech to the U.N. General Assembly, Mahathir bin Mohamad said that although the information age facilitated worldwide knowledge, it also demeaned moral values. ``Smut and violence gratuitously distributed by criminals in the North is no less polluting than carbon dioxide emissions nor less dangerous than drug trafficking.'' In a reference to the United States he said if one great power could apply its laws to citizens of another country for drug trafficking ``why cannot countries with different moral codes extradite the traffickers of pornography for legal action?'' ``Before the whole world sinks deeper into moral decay, the international community should act. Abuse of the ubiquitous Internet system must be stopped,'' he said. Politically, he said the monopoly of the West's electronic media should be broken on so-called world news networks. ``Not only are distorted pictures of our countries being broadcast but our own capacity to understand what is happening is being undermined,'' he said. [...] ``It is boring almost. And yet nothing much has been done which could bring about amelioration of this sad state of affairs, `` he said. ********* RANGOON, BURMA, 1996 SEP 27 (NB) -- Burma has made owning, using, importing or borrowing a modem or fax machine without government permission a crime, punishable by up to 15 years in jail, according to a report by United Press International. Burma's military government has imposed what's called "The Computer Science Development Law" which empowers the Ministry of Communications, Posts and Telegraphs to specify what exactly can be restricted, UPI reports. UPI quotes the government-run newspaper New Light of Myanmar as saying the same punishment is prescribed for anyone who sets up a link with a computer network without the prior permission of the ministry, or who uses computer network and information technology "for undermining state security, law and order, national unity, national economy and national culture, or who obtains or transmits state secrets." UPI reports that in July a diplomat, Leo Nichols, died in prison after he was sentenced to a lengthy term for illegal possession of fax machines. *********** SINGAPORE, Sept. 28 (UPI) -- Internet users in Singapore are complaining that a new system to police the massive global communications network is slowing down access to websites rather than speeding it up as promised by government officials, news reports said Saturday. Earlier this month, special computers called proxy servers began censoring all requests for websites from Singapore Internet users, blocking access to those deemed ``objectionable'' by the government. The proxy servers, which began regulating cyperspace Sept. 15, delay access to the Internet because they first have to check a list of banned websites before retrieving requested homepages, the Straits Times reported. ``I've found that it can take twice as long to access the sites I commonly access,'' said Teo Mei Chin, a 22-year-old undergraduate. Users pointed out that slower access translated into longer on-line time and higher telephone bills. Although many Internet subscribers in the tightly-controlled city- state anticipated such delays under the new system, the Singapore Broadcasting Authority assured users access to certain websites would actually be quicker since the proxy servers are able to store frequently requested homepages. But Internet users say the filter computers also are dishing up outdated homepages. Walter Wu, who uses the Internet for up-to-date stock market and business data, said some financial websites he requested were at least a day old. [...] *********** LONDON, ENGLAND, 1996 SEP 27 (NB) -- By Steve Gold. The British government has added its support to plans to handle the problem of child pornography on the Internet. The proposals, which have been drawn up by the Home Office with assistance from Peter Dawe, the founder of Pipex, the UK's largest Internet service provider (ISP), are known as Safety Net. According to Dawe, recent discussions in the industry, culminating in a letter from the police to the various ISPs in the UK, has meant there is considerable pressure on the ISP industry to exercise a degree of self-regulation. "Public opinion said that something had to be done. I came to the conclusion that it was going to be impossible to establish industry- wide consensus on how to tackle this issue," he said, adding that the idea of Safety Net is gathering support in the UK ISP community. According to Dawe, Safety Net has the backing of the Internet Service Provider's Association (ISPA), as well as the London Internet Exchange, two groups which claim to represent most of the ISPs currently operating in the UK. [...] Quite how the ISPs will tackle the problem, such as blocking access to those Web pages, remains to be seen, but Dawes claims that the ISPs will have no excuse in law of being unaware of offending Web pages and Usenet newsgroups. [...] ********** BRUSSELS (Reuter) - European Union telecommunications ministers, reacting to a child-sex scandal in Belgium, pledged Friday to consider ways to keep illegal material that could harm children off the Internet. Belgian Telecommunications Minister Elio Di Rupo announced that his government planned to implement new measures requiring Internet access providers to monitor and report material featuring sexual abuse or exploitation of children. He asked his colleagues to join forces with him. ``Today a big legal vacuum exists, for legislation is falling behind technological evolution,'' he said, according to a speaking note that was distributed to reporters. ``There is a big risk that it will create an enormous market of children fed on by criminals.'' The ministers agreed to expand a working party that has already been set up to look at the question of illegal material on the Internet and asked it to come up with concrete proposals before they meet again in November. The group will include representatives of the 15 EU telecoms ministries and of companies that provide access to online services or prepare the content, a statement adopted by the ministers said. The accord follows an agreement by EU justice ministers in Dublin Thursday to extend the scope of the EU police agency Europol so it can fight the sex trade in women and children. The moves come in the wake of the discovery in Belgium of a paedophile network and the murders of four young girls. But some of the telecoms ministers, including those from Britain and Sweden, warned that the EU could not wander into censorship and had to focus on fighting truly illegal material. [...] ******** CENTRAL, HONG KONG, 1996 SEP 26 (NB) -- By Eric Lai. A Hong Kong Internet enthusiast is claiming that his Web site, featuring sexually suggestive photos of himself, was forcibly removed by his Internet service provider (ISP) two days ago in a seeming act of premature censorship. Donald Tu, 32, is a former radio and TV presenter and aspiring bodybuilder and model. In May, he put up his Web site, http://members/hknet.com/~hkstud/ , which featured photos of himself topless, often wearing nothing more than wet, slightly transparent briefs, posing in a studio and outdoors at scenic locations around Hong Kong. Tu, who was interviewed on last night's premiere of the Dataphile On-Air radio show, says his site has received thousands of "hits" coupled with encouraging e-mail, especially after a local Chinese language newspaper on September 17 reviewed his Web site. But a single complaint outweighs those thousands of positive comments, at least according to his Web host, HKNet. After receiving a single complaint from a member of the public, HKNet wrote to Tu on Tuesday that "the government may take action against the site because of its content and 'exposure,' based on the letter of the law governing obscene and indecent materials, and recent experiences in its enforcement. Therefore, we have made the decision to bar access to the questionable materials for the time being." But ISPs which censor and regulate content are not currently being compelled by the government, according to a spokesperson at the Broadcasting, Culture, and Sport Branch. The Branch has been devising Internet content regulations all summer which should be announced soon. [...] ********* BEIJING, Sept 27 (Reuter) - China's Communist Party chief Jiang Zemin moved on Friday to tighten the communists' grip on the state media and to strengthen his position with a blaze of publicity before a party plenum. He used a visit to the Beijing offices of the People's Daily, the party mouthpiece, to deliver a hardline speech on the importance of maintaining communist control of all media, the newspaper reported, splashing the news and three photographs of Jiang across its front page. Diplomats said the speech by Jiang was aimed at bringing back into line Chinese writers and more daring media organisations that have tried to push the limits of propaganda [...] ``Historical experience has proved repeatedly that whether guidance of news is right or wrong has to do with the party growing strong ... the solidarity of the people and the prosperity of the nation,'' Jiang said. [...] ******** HotWired 27-29 Sept 96 The Netizen by Wendy Grossman London, 26 September Last Monday, a unified front of British police, government, and representatives of leading ISPs announced proposals for cracking down on illegal material available on the UK's portion of the Internet. The first target is child pornography, but the protagonists have already said they've set their sights on other types of illegal material such as copyright violations, obscenity, and possibly hate speech. Called R3/Safety-Net, the proposals were presented to the media by Science and Technology Minister Ian Taylor and representatives from the Internet Service Providers' Association (ISPA), the London Internet Exchange (LINX), and the Home Office, which is the government department charged with law enforcement. [...] As it turns out, Demon and the Department of Trade and Industry had been talking without publicity for months about taking action against obscenity on the Net. But the media raised the pressure, as did complaints on uk.censorship about a list of 133 newsgroups that Superintendent Mike Hoskins of the Clubs and Vice unit of the Metropolitan Police had sent ISPs as a guide to the location of illegal material. Hoskins and the ISPs all swear no threat was intended or taken, but the underlying tone was still: You do something about it, or we'll do something about it. R3/Safety-Net is that something. [...] No one is going to oppose these measures. How can they, when the 1994 revision of the Criminal Justice Bill allows the police to arrest, without warrant, people suspected of obscenity and certain child pornography offenses? Child pornography is, of course, illegal to create, distribute, or possess in Britain. For the purposes of the Obscene Publications Act and the Protection of Children Act, if something looks like a child in a sexual act, it is child pornography. [...] So it seemed like with Monday's announcement, everybody wins - almost. The government gets to look like it's doing something big. The ISPs get to stay out of jail. The police get to arrest people. Peter Dawe gets to be a hero. Britain gets to be a world leader. And we get ... well, what do we get? We get the certain knowledge that they will not stop here. They have already said so. Books like the Anarchist's Cookbook are banned here in print, and in a country where last Monday police seized a massive haul of IRA explosives intended to rearrange the landscape, the argument for letting people read alt.engr.explosives is likely to lead to the withdrawal of reference books from the public libraries. Britain has an Official Secrets Act, not a Freedom of Information Act. Government can proceed only with the consent of the governed, and on Monday what that unified panel asked for was our trust. They will not censor free speech; it's just the small percentage of illegal stuff they want cleaned up. So we're left asking before every move, "Daddy, is this illegal?" ********** Subject--Germany Bans Web Pages for Minors - and ALL To--fight-censorship@vorlon.mit.edu Date--Mon, 30 Sep 1996 13:37:52 +0100 (MET) Reply-To--um@c2.net (Ulf Moeller) Organization--private site, Hamburg (Germany) From--um@c2.net (Ulf Moeller) The report is essentially correct. In Hamburg, the prosecutors decided themselves that AOL had done nothing illegal, so as far as I know there was no court decision. Also, it appears that said Federal Office is neither responsible for electronic nor for foreign publications. I think the minister is trying to spead FUD. >From--taxbomber@taxbomber.com >Newsgroups--alt.censorship,alt.privacy,alt.security,news.admin.censorship >Subject--Germany Bans Web Pages for Minors - and ALL >Date--Sat, 28 Sep 1996 06:46:58 GMT >Message-ID--<324cc9c7.7567566@news.c2.net> >NNTP-Posting-Host--md19-017.compuserve.com According to Germany's leading tabloid paper "Bild" (Saturday edition), Federal Minister for Familiy Affairs, Claudia Nolte (Christian-Democrat), in an unprecedented decision has formally had several Web pages banned for being "X"-rated by the "Federal Office for the Evaluation of Literature Hazardous to Minors". These are pages featured by Ernst Zuendel, a leading political revisionist located in Canada whose purportedly "Neo-Nazi" views have been the subject of much controversy in Germany. Ms Nolte is quoted as saying: "It is not tolerable that the Internet should be an island with special privileges, on which thoughtless or unscrupulous providers may pursue their infamous activities with impunity." This effectively forces Internet providers to restrict minors' access to said pages - a technical impossibility since most minors accessing the net are be using their parents' accounts. No "Netwatch" or other self-censorship software will suffice to conform with this provision, as it is THE PROVIDERS, not the kids' legal guardians who have to comply with this restriction. Following a recent decision by the State of Hamburg's Supreme ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Mar 1996 22:51:01 CST From: CuD Moderators Subject: File 6--Cu Digest Header Info (unchanged since 7 Apr, 1996) Cu-Digest is a weekly electronic journal/newsletter. Subscriptions are available at no cost electronically. CuD is available as a Usenet newsgroup: comp.society.cu-digest Or, to subscribe, send post with this in the "Subject:: line: SUBSCRIBE CU-DIGEST Send the message to: cu-digest-request@weber.ucsd.edu DO NOT SEND SUBSCRIPTIONS TO THE MODERATORS. The editors may be contacted by voice (815-753-0303), fax (815-753-6302) or U.S. mail at: Jim Thomas, Department of Sociology, NIU, DeKalb, IL 60115, USA. 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