UK smut filter may have sent game patch to sin-bin

UK gamers believer they're bumping into that country's mandatory ISP-level smut filters, courtesy of a filename that accidentally red-flags the purience-punting grumble-blockers. Courtesy of this Reddit thread, it seems that users trying to download upgrades to the game League of Legends are stalling when they reach files …

[ChrisM]

Well that's my holiday ruined!

I'll never be able to download the tourist guide to Scunthorpe!

[Da Weezil]

Filters are folly.

This is what happens when you allow a bunch of technophobic Mrs Lovejoys to dictate policy instead of telling them in clear terms that they need to take responsibility for the action of their little cherubs when they venture onto the interwebs.

I dont need or want filtering, The under16's who use my connection (all 5 of them over the last 10 years) have been involved in frank discussions about the dangers that can lurk on line - and in the real world - if you subscribe to the immature belief that the world is a nice place free of dangers and nastiness the rude awakenings await both your offspring and you a little further down the road when you finally encounter real life. Forewarned is forearmed - and a dose of reality about the world is GOOD for any kid growing up - as is parental oversight of the activities, rather than expecting network filtering to babysit the kids that they are too lazy - or stupid - to supervise.

These are the same idiots who believe that children should go through childhood wrapped in cotton wool so they cant hurt themselves with such dangers as Conker matches or climbing trees, only to find that once they hit their teens that drink/drugs/driving fast does actually get you hurt and hurting is not a great feeling.

I never did get this ridiculous attitude towards matters of a sexual nature - we all do it, iots healthy and natural, the more we try to make it furtive and shameful the more we risk people developing unhealthy attitudes and practices.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Filters are folly.

Well said. I've got my first sprog on the way and I'm going to tell it to do loads of dangerous things, sensibly. Although if it's anything like I was when I was a kid it'll do the exact opposite and be a little angel just to piss me off.

[David 45]

Re: Filters are folly.

Here, here, sir! Cracking good comment and I couldn't have put it better myself!

[P. Lee]

Re: Filters are folly.

Filters are not folly.

I put one at the top of the stairs which only allowed objects smaller than my child or much larger/stronger than my child through or over.

Few people thought I was stupid. I certainly talked to my children about the dangers of stairs. Despite understanding what I was saying, I didn't remove the filter straight away and we went on many training runs up and down the stairs together. If ever I was doing things upstairs, I'd often take the her up with me, close the stair-gate and pop her down while I got on with the jobs. I don't think it ever crossed my mind that I might be too lazy or stupid to remove the stair-gate and spend all my time supervising the child. I rather thought it was a good idea to let them explore the environment on their own, within certain prescribed boundaries.

Even after the star-gate was gone, she didn't have unrestricted access to the park down the road. Outside the front-door was out of bounds, for a while, regardless of whether she actually wanted to visit the park, or just sit on the doormat.

Pre-puberty, children don't really have a "sexual nature." It isn't something they really come up with except by imitation and the desire to "be grown up." To them, sex is just a bit weird and yucky and not interesting. An 8 year-old and an 15 year-old are not the same.

The (correct) proposal that sex is both healthy and natural rather obscures the fact that there is a lot of rather unhealthy sex available for viewing on the internet and on TV. The human race has managed to have sex just fine without the internet. The kids don't need it and it's generally unhelpful to their education. If my kids are going to the internet to find out about sex, I think I've probably failed in a big way. Sex on screen is rarely educational and almost always misleading. From the ultra-thin models, to the air-brushing and pristine hair, to the extreme expertise even of first-timers, to the constant ecstasy and the merry-go-round of partners. Sex on screen doesn't reflect real-life and even when people know that, the constant repetition of the lies is difficult to counter. Hence, no uncontrolled TV in the house. The internet is more difficult to control because it actually has a useful use, unlike TV, which doesn't.

It's worse when you introduce all-out porn. The sex on screen may be fake, but the sexual experience of the watcher is real. Sex becomes something conducted utterly at their own discretion with absolutely no need to consider anyone else. It is utterly selfish with any whim catered for at the click of a mouse. No real partner can or should have to live up to that. There are lots of subtle lies out there. When it comes to children, they have, by definition, not completed their training to be knowledgeable, rational and responsible adults. When you first put them on a bike, you hold it and take complete control. As they learn, you relax the controls. You don't give your 3 year old a sharp knife because they want to cut a piece of paper. You filter their access to the kitchen knives. They know they are there, they just can't reach them.

I would be the first to suggest that the way the government has gone about things with national network level filters is folly and to be utterly resisted, but there is no particular reason to suggest that the entire idea of filters is always wrong. It should be enabled by request on a per-account basis with real-time logging to an agent so you can tell what's going on when things mysteriously fail.

Sadly it appears that people are behaving like the government. They take a few nice sound-bite arguments against these particular filters and make an argument against any sort of controls in any situation, in much the same way as the government takes sound bites for some good ideas and turns them into a completely inappropriate argument for infrastructure which shouldn't exist.

Straw-man arguments on both sides obscure the issues and ruin the debate.

[Steve 129]

Re: Filters are folly.

Having the filters available isn't the issue though. It is the 'forced' nature of them, and the underhand way the government is trying to say "ahh but you have a choice... all you have to say is 'let me access pron' and we will take them away so you can be a parent on your own"

Lets say you have a very small set of stairs (say 2 steps) and you CHOOSE to not put a gate up and let your child learn by falling down the steps a couple of times to learn it is not a good idea to go head first, then that is your choice.

[Steve Evans]

Re: Well that's my holiday ruined!

You joke, but this happened a few years back. I think it was AOL who introduced a similarly badly thought through, and implemented, nanny-net that wiped Scunny from the map.

Nice to know that all the lessons have been learnt so well eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Somehow I don't think so.....

Otherwise Wessex, Sussex, Middlesex, Essex and many other places in England would be wiped of the map quite quickly (some may argue that's no bad thing).

[Natalie Gritpants]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

Wessex is an idea, not a place. Just saying.

[Soruk]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

Not just an idea, it was a kingdom in its own right!

While we're at it, we can no longer teach our youngsters how navigation was carried out pre-GPS using a sextant.

Use of the RCA 1802 microprocessor can't be taught because it contains the opcode SEX (Set EXecution register).

Panasonic's parent company cannot be mentioned - Matsushita - along with many names in Japan.

Musicians will be unable to play sextets.

... and never forget Belgium.

[TRT]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

And just forget the biro-centric website Pen Island.

[Michael Habel]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

I sir am shocked that you'd use such a gratuitous and offensive word like that outside of a sererious Screenplay.

[TRT]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

And forget googling "The Town Of Uckfield In Sussex"

[Steve Evans]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

Or Cocking, West Sussex GU29

Lady Hole Lane, Ashbourne, Derbyshire

etc etc...

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Somehow I don't think so..... @SORUK

"Use of the RCA 1802 microprocessor can't be taught because it contains the opcode SEX (Set EXecution register)."

Interestingly 'RCA' is a very naughty acronym found in the Urban Dicktionary.

[TRT]

'RCA'?

I thought RCA was a type of coupling... a specification for a male/female interconnect with a simple centre pole and ring arrangement.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

"Panasonic's parent company cannot be mentioned - Matsushita"

I think you mean "Matsupoopa".

[TitterYeNot]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

"Wessex is an idea, not a place. Just saying"

I don't know, I think I'd much rather watch 'The Only Way Is Wessex' than the current alternative. A lot more axes and helmets I should imagine...

[Simon Harris]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

"Wessex is an idea, not a place. Just saying."

*pffffffft* - the sound of all those Thomas Hardy ebook downloads disappearing.

[Jedit]

"Wessex, Sussex, Middlesex, Essex"

I always wondered why there was a West Saxon, a South Saxon, a Middle Saxon and an East Saxon but no North Saxon. Then I realised it was probably because they tried calling it "Nosex" and everybody left.

[Cian Duffy]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

I stayed in a hotel which refused to let me read an article detailing Sussex CCC results due to "adult content" but did, however, let me on to pretty much any other website I tried.

[Ben Bonsall]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

Peniston?

[T. F. M. Reader]

Re: Somehow I don't think so.....

Nah, Middlesex is no problem, it's the other sexes that will be filtered.

[A Non e-mouse]

Just think of all those children saved from nasty peados by the blocking of these morally corrupt files. It just goes to show that the government's filters are working.

</sarcasm>

[Mephistro]

Another tool for mischief! Hooray!

So the baddies can Google-bomb the name of some OS update or security program update, so that the smut filter just blocks said updates?

Sirs, we truly live in enlightened times! New uses for censorship are being discovered almost every week. None of those uses are good, though. :-|

[Fluffy Bunny]

Re: Another tool for mischief! Hooray!

Pretty much none of the existing uses are any good, either.

[Nigel 11]

Heaven help you ...

... if you live in Scunthorpe.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Heaven help you ...

Dear Nigel, please read previous comments before posting.

[Spiracle]

Re: Heaven help you ...

My wife comes from Scunthorpe. She was in the Scunthorpe and District Schools Orchestra which gave every member a T-Shirt with the name written in a circle around the logo on the front. They all quickly learnt never to wear it under a V-neck jumper.

[TRT]

Re: Heaven help you ...

I tried desperately to get an embroidered top made up for work. City University Network Team.

[DaddyHoggy]

Re: Heaven help you ...

The original name for Newcastle Polytechnic when it was becoming a University (now the University of Northumbria) - was...

City University Newcastle-upon-Tyne

- since they didn't use the 'u' in 'upon' in the Acronym, that would have been an interesting first test print run of the new letterhead...

[Breen Whitman]

Well, pasting from the original section re the internet filter we see:

12.2.3 Banned IP addresses broadly portraying pedophilia, death or "snuff", League of Legends, bestiality, plus other grossly offensive material (Section 12.1.1)

[MrXavia]

I assume any site that gives a voice to Theresa May will be banned, I find her Grossly Offensive..

[Sequin]

A well known American quiz show winner sends out a weekly quiz by email which he numbers using Roman numerals. Every couple of months he has to change to Arabic numerals for a few weeks due to the number of spam filters that grab anything with XXX in the name.

[NightFox]

I used to work for an Investment Bank (not as a banker I hasten to add) who introduced email filtering. One of the words that would cause an email to get blocked was "rape" - it took several days and the bank potentially lost a considerable amount before the rape seed oil analysts and traders realised what was happening.

[T. F. M. Reader]

Banker lexicon

@NightFox: I seriously doubt rape seed oil trading was as much as the rounding error of the overall losses, given the normal, matter-of-course, business-as-usual vocabulary of your average banker.

FWIW, I remember when "business-appropriate" filtering was introduced in the messaging system of one of the world's major global financial information networks - the one whose owner later became the Mayor of New York City, if you really must ask. The effects were splashed over the front page of the Wall Street Journal, as I recall (in the 90ies - the paper didn't even belong to Murdoch then).

One conspiracy theory was that the real purpose of the filtering was to block the famously foul-mouthed company owner (he was not a politician yet). But the most noticeable effect was the frantic experimentation, on a *massive* scale, by everybody and his sister to see what would and what would not be blocked. In many different languages. For many days. Probably at the expense of real work.

[Darryl]

That's why there seems to be a push to rename all of the varieties of rape seed 'canola' even though that's only one of the many variations.

[Adrian 4]

I worked for an engineering company whose contracted-out IT department filtered references to 'screw' from our delicate sensibilities.

[Eddy Hall]

So, no Scunthorpe test was performed on our national filter? Difficult to believe....

[Piro]

Spelling mistake in your post

You wrote "Easy" as "Difficult". Odd mistake to make, but there you go.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Scunthorpe test

The basic Scunthorpe test is to run common dictionary terms past a filter and see if it nabs the wrong ones. It doesn't usually extend to testing CamelCase phrases because there are too many of them.

[codejunky]

Ha

I look forward to seeing if this is a server issue or a filter issue. This would be an awesome mistake to bring the problems of filtering to the masses. Especially to those who thought filters would be easy.

[Richard 26]

Re: Ha

"I look forward to seeing if this is a server issue or a filter issue."

I find it hard to believe that ISPs do packet inspection on the whole data stream and then apply crude filters to it. That's what GCHQ and the NSA are for, surely; I doubt ISPs have the capability.

X site got stupidly on a blacklist is plausible. This, not so much: more likely, it's either completely untrue or some sort of local issue with a web filter or proxy.

[JimBob 2]

They could easily test if this is the filter by uploading blank files with those filenames to a web server and getting the users with filtered connections to try to download them. If the filters really are blocking this deep based on filenames, really bad things are going to happen as more people are exposed to the filters.

[Adam 1]

To be fair, it is no worse than their false positive rate for four months of Skype activity.

[thosrtanner]

on the other hand it's possible that it looks for sex and then whitelists sussex, essex, wessex, middlesex. because that's the way programmers minds work :-(

[lglethal]

Oh please, oh please

Microsoft I beg you! Please make one of the next Patch Tuesday files have some variant of sex in the name. When millions of Britons find they cant update their computers because of the filter, there will be outrage and condemnation. Hopefully it will be enough to create such a massive backlash that the filters will be relegated to the rubbish bin of history forthwith...

... oh wait I just realised that the chances of millions of Britons actually updating their windows machines on Patch Tuesday anyway are about as low as the chances of finding an honest man in politics. Oh well back to the drawing board...

[Miek]

Re: Oh please, oh please

" When millions of Britons find they cant update their computers because of the filter," -- Don't make me laugh, who actually does the updates ?

[Ken Hagan]

Re: Oh please, oh please

"Don't make me laugh, who actually does the updates ?"

Everyone who hasn't consciously switched them off. In a corporate environment, switching off or re-directing to a WSUS server may be quite common, but once you start talking about home users who get the nice lad at PC World to set them up ... I suspect that *most* Windows boxes are still set to auto-update.

[Dave 126]

There have been stories like this...

...since the early nineties, when schools were getting t'internet and using crude filters. IIRC, Beaver University had to change its name to Colorado University as a result.

[Michael Habel]

Re: There have been stories like this...

Beaver University

Thanks now I have something to google up when I get home...

[Nigel Whitfield.]

Re: There have been stories like this...

And the magazine now known as "Canada's History" was formerly called "The Beaver"

Hilarious japes and mix-ups ensued.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/the-beaver-gets-a-new-name-1.865851

[A Bee]

Re: There have been stories like this...

You write as if "crude filters" are a thing of the past.

Let me assure you that they are still in place.

See http://beewaxing.wordpress.com/2014/01/23/the-invention-of-paul-roostercroft/

[BongoJoe]

Workaround

Wouldn't this be avoided if one used a proper ISP rather than a megaCorp who advertise in glossy magazines?

ISPs are like computer dealers; if I wanted a PC I wouldn't go to PC World, as perhaps 99% of right minded El Reg readers wouldn't, so by the same token I wouldn't go for an ISP which does this sort of thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Workaround

Unfortunately in the UK you have three commonly used ways of getting on the internet: ADSL, 3G and cable. ADSL lines are all run by BT with various companies providing services using them. For 3G a few providers each have their own networks. For cable, which provides the best download speeds by far, there's a monopoly. If you want those speeds, you have no choice to go with that provider, and they're one of those who have to block content. That's why you can't get to the Pirate Bay. Oh, hang on, you can go to ukbay.org (fewer characters to type even) instead. Well, that's a good filter isn't it?

[Havin_it]

Re: Workaround

>ADSL lines are all run by BT with various companies providing services using them.

Misleading. BT OpenReich (a spinoff) manages (to regularly make a bags of) the physical infrastructure, wires, exchanges and so forth. Everything from that point onward is controlled by the ISP, be it BT or anyone else, and that includes the filtering. So no, you do not get filtered just because your ADSL comes through a "BT" phone line.

[Irongut]

Re: Workaround

There has never been filtering on my BT Openreach provided line and there will never be unless my ISP introduces it as a product. You are confusing the fascist retail arm of BT with the good blokes who provide the tubes.

It is very easy to avoid these filters, just don't sign up with the cheapest ISP you see on the telly.

[Miek]

Re: Workaround

"You are confusing the fascist retail arm of BT with the good blokes who provide the tubes." -- that distinction between those two arms of BT's only exists to avoid their being a monopoly issue in the first place.

[Crisp]

The filter is working exactly as predicted.

Why is anyone surprised? The vast majority of savvy El Reg readers said it would do this, and lo it has come to pass!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ordered by Cameron, the tosser who leaves his kids in the pub and drives off.

Ordered by Mumsnet, the women who want to sit on forums scaremongering the terrors of the world, but then want someone else to protect their kids online.

[Gordon 11]

Ordered by Cameron, the tosser who leaves his kids in the pub and drives off.

I sympathise with him for that. My wife once left our son in the butcher's (in his pushchair). Arrived with pushchair and two daughters attached - left with two daughters in hand. It's easily done. When you don't feel they are in danger you stop worrying.

But getting more back on thread (re: the rape seed oil above) my wife also mentions a car journey her friend had with her mum (aunt/gran?) on board. As they passed a field carpeted in a yellow flowering crop she piped up with,

"Look at that field of..." then paused, searching for the word...

"fuck".

[Miek]

We all get left 'somewhere' as a kid.

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no "national" filter: each ISP implements their own, in their own way.

Afaik, none of them look at filenames. The government requirement is to block access to specific domain names, not to specific filenames.

[Alister]

@AC 10:43

There is no "national" filter: each ISP implements their own, in their own way.

Afaik, none of them look at filenames. The government requirement is to block access to specific domain names, not to specific filenames.

Look, will you stop being rational and serious about this, it spoils the story...

[Suricou Raven]

Different part.

The court-ordered blocks for copyright infringement require blocking access to specific domain names.

The no-porn blocks are semi-official government requests*. There is no official standard as to what needs to be blocked, or how, so it's up to each ISP to decide what they want to do.

* "Please block all porn. We ask in a non-legally-binding manner and you do not have to comply. But if you don't, we're coming back with a law to compel you. Probably a really badly-written one, with harsh penalties for failing to meet impossible goals."

[J.G.Harston]

Government says: "Please block all porn..."

To which the response is: "Please define 'porn' in a manner that a computer can use."

[Anonymous Coward]

computers don't use porn

I do.

[Sequin]

Can we ask Microsoft to resurrect their Critical Update Notificatin Tool?

[James O'Shea]

no can do, Ballmer's leaving.

[Anonymous Coward]

Experts!

Reminds me years ago the Experts Exchange web site registered was 'expertsexchange' and after a while, they couldn't understand why they was being hit with some many, er, certain types of people.

It was hastily changed to what we see now 'experts-exchange'.

[Michael Habel]

Reminds me years ago the Experts Exchange web site registered was 'expertsexchange' and after a while, they couldn't understand why they was being hit with some many, er, certain types of people.

It was hastily changed to what we see now 'experts-exchange

Such a Site would've been ran by the NHS surly?

[TRT]

They run ...

TherapistOnlineResource.org.uk

[1Rafayal]

Re: They run ...

Lol, well I cannot get to the URI anymore!!

[Roj Blake]

Re: They run ...

And who can forget PenIsland.com?

[Anonymous Coward]

Had to tone down the office email filter once

The previous IT guy had it set very strict and it failed on an acronym used (commonly) for Temperature Indicating Transmitters. The spread sheet they were trying to email through was fine with the Flow Indicating Transmitters (FITs) and Pressure Indicating Transmitters (PITs)

[storner]

Reminds of when I worked for an american company, who had all their internal e-mail filtered by MessageLabs - with a similar filter for "bad words".

Unfortunately, in danish the word for "finish" is "slut" ... so all project plans written in danish were banned from being e-mailed until the higher-ups found out what happened.

[Miek]

Don't the Danes like the Fins then ?

[Anonymous Coward]

I also remember a friend from the USA telling me that CLINT was a banned user name...

[Anonymous Coward]

Will any of these sites make it past the filter?

http://www.boredpanda.com/worst-domain-names/

[leaway2]

Working at an airport, we get BUM's Baggage Unload messages. This has been filtered.

[JulianB]

I've been briefed on more than one company reorganisation where the speaker said something like "This role would logically be called Business Unit Manager, but we obviously can't use that..."

[Measurer]

Obscene Geography

Shitterton (Dorset), This is getting seriously draconian!

[JulianB]

Re: Obscene Geography

Interestingly, that place name means exactly what it looks like. I don't have my Dictionary of English Place-names to hand, but the entry is words to the effect of "Town with a stream used as an open sewer".

[Anonymous Coward]

Write to your MP!!!!!!!

This is the only way that this will get fixed.

Mind you, my clueless MP just sent me a reply saying "Think of the children", the irony being that's what I was doing; if you have an imperfect filter for adult content the situation will arise that your children will get hold of adult material and get a messed idea about what it means whereas you should be educating your children about adult content which eradicates the need for a filter and any excuse for not educating your children it gives.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Write to your MP!!!!!!!

"my clueless MP just sent me a reply saying "Think of the children", the irony being that's what I was doing"

I wouldn't say that too loudly if I were you.

[Alan Edwards]

> Riot Games could shoulder some small amount of the blame

No, it rests entirely with the numpties that set the filter up. It is insane to block anything that has a specific sequence of letters in the name with no reference to the context. What are they supposed to do, name their patches 'FluffyKittens1', 'FluffyKittens2' etc?

Anything which has 'extended' (or 'experience', 'expert', you get the idea...) after a plural will be blocked. As someone else has said, anything referencing the town of Scunthorpe will be blocked.

[Ed_UK]

No Flange Either

I had to change a coolant flange(*) on my previous car. I was asked to give a brief write-up on a car-related web-site. However, their anti-profanity filter removed the F-word, replacing it with ******. Nice work, guys!

(*) It's a part of the coolant system which connects the end of a hose to a hole on the side of the engine.

[Anonymous Coward]

I remember when Google got fed up with China's censorship and pulled out.

What they should do for those whose geographic location points to the UK is embed <!-- sex --> into the source code of every single Google page they visit, and everyone who uses the default censorship scheme will be unable to use them.

[MrZoolook]

XBox live refused to accept...

... grapes, poop (poop deck) and prick (with a needle) on a multiplayer session of Quarrel. They are only offensive if used in a particular context. Rather like boob, jerk, and tit, all of which are allowed.

That's why this kind of filtering is a bad idea... it doesn't (censored) work, you (censored) (censored) pieces of (censored).