back to article Virgin Media blocks Imgur, literally tens of people rage at UK ISP

UK internet service provider Virgin Media has insisted it does not block entire domains "as a matter of course" after it stopped its customers from viewing the whole of Imgur this morning – on the say-so of the Internet Watch Foundation. Britons attempting to view pictures from the file-sharing site were greeted with dire …

  1. 's water music
    FAIL

    looking forward to the Who? Me? column

    from the Virgin block-list tech who thought I can save myself some time with a wildcard here

    1. baud

      Re: looking forward to the Who? Me? column

      Or "oops, I added a space between the domain and the rest of the URL". I think it happened before with Google

  2. Claverhouse Silver badge

    Would it not be simpler to replace the whole internet with that TV test pattern of a wholesome little girl ?

    1. Hans Neeson-Bumpsadese Silver badge

      Would it not be simpler to replace the whole internet with that TV test pattern of a wholesome little girl ?

      Oh my lord, no. Just no. That clown character sitting next to her is seriously f***ing sinister

    2. cosymart
      Go

      Why not...

      An interesting experiment would be to only re-enable those who noticed. It would reduce the number of IP addresses in use by cloned/dead/users by a few billion and solve the IPV4 problem instantly :-)

      See icon - What is "flank" speed??

      1. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

        Re: Why not...

        What is "flank" speed?

        The maximum speed the ship can do, heedless of fuel consumption or possible engine damage. It's faster than "full" speed, which is the maximum that the ship can reliably sustain.

        1. NetBlackOps

          Re: Why not...

          Technically, we had flank speed and emergency flank, the latter of which would likely involve components of the reduction gears becoming ballistic missiles. This was a gas turbine destroyer, things are sometimes a bit different.

          Still, accurate summary.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "6,139 blocked URLs"

    Is it just me... or is that barely worth the effort of an entire organisation of people hunting them down, the infrastructure to provide that to every ISP, every ISP being required to scan every web access for those URLs, and the mistakes caused thereby?

    Don't get me wrong - those kinds of images can't ever be condoned - but that's not a very big number compared to the billions of different URLs accessed daily from any one ISP. It seems an awful lot of misguided effort to put in so much infrastructure for such a small number of URLs, which could literally be just one image, or one entire domain, I assume?

    I mean... it's *good* that it's such a small number. It's *not* good that it's non-zero, but scumbags exist. But... are we really stopping anything happening here, compared to where those images are presumably *actually* being traded, which is presumably *not* via HTTP or those URLs at all?

    1. Jellied Eel Silver badge

      Is it just me... or is that barely worth the effort of an entire organisation of people hunting them down, the infrastructure to provide that to every ISP, every ISP being required to scan every web access for those URLs, and the mistakes caused thereby?

      ISP's aren't (currently) required to scan & block, but sensible ones do. And that was really the point of the IWF. A community resource that acted as a SPOC for reporting child abuse online, and providing some way for ISPs to restrict access to it. But it does more than just hunting down abuse, ie it works with law enforcement in the UK and abroad to hunt down the abusers. So the 6,139 URLs are probably the tip of the iceberg & used to fluctuate depending on how quickly illegal content was taken down.

      To me, it's that law enforcement liason role that is it's most valuable function. It's also an area where there has been some contention, ie IWF was originally created and chartered to prevent child abuse, but there is/was pressure to expand into political & 'hate' crimes.

      1. rg287

        To me, it's that law enforcement liason role that is it's most valuable function. It's also an area where there has been some contention, ie IWF was originally created and chartered to prevent child abuse, but there is/was pressure to expand into political & 'hate' crimes.

        Yes, it occurred to me that stopping people tripping over stuff accidentally is really just a happy side effect of more general intelligence gathering.

        The charter seems to have been reined back a bit, which is good. At one point their remit was expanded to include Hate material, but that has been wound back to a core focus on Child Abuse (they don't like the term child pornography because pornography implies consent) and limited other criminally obscene content. Which is right and proper because they're not the Police, they're a charity - and it not the job of either ISPs or IWF to decide what constitutes "hate speech". CP is generally a bit more cut-and-dried.

        They always were a bit ripe for mission creep though, compared say to CEOP within the National Crime Agency whose remit is pretty clearly marked on the nameplate.

        1. MonkeyCee

          Porn versus abuse

          "they don't like the term child pornography because pornography implies consent"

          Sort of, I'll try to explain.

          Images of child abuse are clearly what the law is aimed at. No-one argues that adults exploiting children is A Bad Thing*.

          Child pornography is any indecent image of someone who isn't an adult. Depending on jurisdiction, this varies a bit, but generally under 18 or under 21. CP (as legally defined) can and is produced and distributed (legally speaking) consensually by teenagers sexting each other.

          There might be possible edge cases, but while all images of child abuse are unacceptable, the law on CP is a big hammer for what can be consensual non-exploitative behavior.

          An equivalent is statutory rape. Obviously a whole host of situations where it clearly is A Bad Thing, but also plenty of 15+17 year old consenting couples where it really shouldn't be treated as such a major issue.**

          * Maybe Epstein's lawyer

          ** one of my friends is a bus driver. Every year, he has to discuss his stat rape conviction, in order to keep his licence. He's still married to the "victim" 25 years later, with two kids. They still don't talk to her parents, since this was there cunnin' plan to break up their teenage romance.

          1. Hemmels
            Pint

            Re: Porn versus abuse

            Sorry about your friend's circumstance. I'll drink to his good health -->

          2. DuncanLarge Silver badge

            Re: Porn versus abuse

            "CP (as legally defined) can and is produced and distributed (legally speaking) consensually by teenagers sexting each other"

            Er no. Just plain wrong. They get arrested too and producing such images no matter what age you are is illegal.

            1. Cederic Silver badge

              Re: Porn versus abuse

              The distribution is legally consensual. The thing being distributed is deemed illegal.

              It's a subtle difference.

        2. Jellied Eel Silver badge

          Which is right and proper because they're not the Police, they're a charity - and it not the job of either ISPs or IWF to decide what constitutes "hate speech". CP is generally a bit more cut-and-dried.

          It was.. a bit odd. So started out as a great idea by Clive Feather (ex-Demon) and a couple of others and pitched to the LINX members who agreed, and the IWF was born. Which raised some issues given at the time, most of the relevant legislation was the Obscene Publications Act, which wasn't really drafted & enacted for an Internet age. So the legislation got revised, but still kinda left the IWF in a bit of a legal limbo given possession of CP was/is a strict liability offence. Which left the IWF in a bit of a precarious position with Home Office and CPS assurances that they wouldn't be prosecuted. I think that got better legal standing as time passed, but such is the Internet and self-regulation, which mostly worked.

          I do remember a fairly heated discussion with a new head of the IWF at one LINX meeting where the desire to get into politics was raised.. And I don't think the chap was too happy with the push-back he got from the membership for the reasons you mention. It wasn't the IWF's purpose to get involved in censorship. AFAIK, and not having been involved in LINX stuff for a while, it's still focused on preventing child abuse, but no doubt still fending off pressure to diversify.

    2. rg287

      I mean... it's *good* that it's such a small number. It's *not* good that it's non-zero, but scumbags exist. But... are we really stopping anything happening here, compared to where those images are presumably *actually* being traded, which is presumably *not* via HTTP or those URLs at all?

      All the IWF stops is people inadvertently following a malicious link to such content. In this respect it has some (minor) value in protecting users (both young and old).

      For the actual scumbags though, no. They're just bouncing through a VPN or TOR and accessing the same content from foreign IPs or indeed directly on TOR hidden services.

      According to the Charity commission, they employ ~30 staff and have turnover of ~£2.9m/yr, which is about 13p/yr per UK household. Not entirely unreasonable (I question whether the Police would do any better with that amount of money for Officers). And presumably it feeds into Police Intelligence so they can go after the nonces operating those sites and the people accessing them deliberately. The direct blocking value is purely against accidental discovery, but presumably has an intelligence value too.

      That being said, £2.9m is up from ~£1.7m about 5 years ago and they have 4 staffers on more than £60k/yr. I know of other charitable organisations with >£6m/yr turnovers and their CEOs are on ~£70k, not £125k. Nice work if you can get it...

      1. Jellied Eel Silver badge

        That being said, £2.9m is up from ~£1.7m about 5 years ago and they have 4 staffers on more than £60k/yr. I know of other charitable organisations with >£6m/yr turnovers and their CEOs are on ~£70k, not £125k. Nice work if you can get it...

        Not sure I'd call reviewing potential CP nice work, but the higher salaries are probably for counsel, and possibly psychologists to keep an eye on the staff's wellbeing. It's no Nominet..

    3. MonkeyCee

      minimum effort

      " But... are we really stopping anything happening here, compared to where those images are presumably *actually* being traded"

      Stopping easy, stumble on access means that anyone who has acquired such material has made a concentrated effort to do it.

      I've run web filtering for a school. Saying "the filter hardly blocks anything, why bother?" isn't a good argument. Kindy to year 11 got a whitelist only, year 12 and 13 got a blacklist and their deans* had access to the reports of their browsing.

      * most of the issues were about bullying

  4. b0llchit Silver badge
    Big Brother

    The safe the children filter

    Guaranteed to work. Guaranteed to be accurate. Guaranteed to be effective. Guaranteed not to be abused. Guaranteed bias neutral. Only a one-liner:

    cat < /dev/null > browserclient.

    Now, let me just check the logs who is trying to see beyond the void.

    /s

    1. Dan 55 Silver badge

      Re: The safe the children filter

      Don't like that browser client, it's too bloated.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The safe the children filter

      And we'll say its for the child so no one complains cause no one wants to be associated with the term child porn.

  5. RFC822

    Imgur hosts the best and worst of the internet, from pictures of cute cats to pornography.

    Yes, but which is which?

    1. Mike007 Bronze badge
      Coat

      It depends on personal preference - some people think ginger pussy's are best, others think they are the worst.

      I suspect the filtering was because someone went and posted "dog lover" content.

    2. David 132 Silver badge

      Well, one is pussy pictures...

      (EDIT: darn, beaten to the obvious pun by Mike007. Ya snooze, ya lose. I’ll leave my own - less witty - contribution here as a permanent testimony to my laggardly ways.)

  6. mark l 2 Silver badge

    I wonder when someone tries to access an URL on the IWF watch list whether this triggers some other further consequence than mealy blocking access? Maybe sending all that IPs traffic logs to GCHQ for further monitoring? Which might bad for any unfortunate VM users who were trying to access a legitimate Imgur URL today.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      'I wonder when someone tries to access an URL on the IWF watch list whether this triggers some other further consequence...'

      Straight from the IWF's spokeswonk's mouth in TFA...

      '..A fault with Virgin Media’s filtering system was incorrectly signposting Virgin’s customers to the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF)'

      Of course, 'signposting', fine word that, one which might mean one innocuous thing to mere plebs, but which means something completely different to them in the context of their operation...sounds a lot 'fluffier' than 'flagging' or 'fingering' or 'grassing on'....

  7. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    I wonder if that constituted a libel against legitimate users.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Vodafone have been blocking imgur for years, that's why I use Google DNS free service. It works better

    1. IGotOut Silver badge

      Yup using Google cuts out the middle man. That way they get to see ALL your web traffic for that big fat advertising money.

    2. Paul

      use 1.1.1.1 instead, Google will monetize your dns searches.

  9. Christoph

    He added: "We never condone over-blocking"

    These are the people who took out the entire Wikipedia site for a single (perfectly legal) image.

    1. Paul Crawford Silver badge

      Not quite. The way their filter works (worked?) for a page-block (instead of domain-block) is to proxy the site so it can be filtered. For something as massive as Wikipedia you can see the first problem on throughput, then the second was the spam-filter for editors then saw all users addresses as the same IP and threw a hissy-fit.

      The bigger issue was the image they were filtering (Scorpions' album cover for "Virgin Killer") was on sale in the 70s with very little issue in many countries (but not all), so it goes to show how the post-60s adults/politicians have become so prudish in dancing to the red-tops latest horror stories to win votes.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        > on sale in the 70s with very little issue in many countries

        There was a lot of stuff like that on sale in the 70's, especially in europe. Thats before we started cracking down on this stuff.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Knock on the door

    Although it was a misconfiguration blocking all of the URL's I guess a lot of people are going to be expecting a knock at the door at 2am followed by a smash of the door and a whole team rushing in.

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