{ texts for nothing }

[UPDATED. See end of post.]

Canada’s big ISPs have agreed to block access to websites listed on a child pornography blacklist. The goal is laudable, but the devil, as usual, is in the details.

First, the facts: The initiative is called Project Cleanfeed Canada. It’s based on a similar project in the UK and has the blessing of the federal government. The blacklist will be maintained by Cybertip.ca, a group that already has a system in place for receiving and analyzing reports of child pornography online. Bell, Bell Aliant, MTS Allstream, Rogers, Shaw, SaskTel, Telus, and Videotron have all signed on.

It’s clear that everyone has their hearts in the right place here. No one wants to help creeps get access to kiddie porn. Aside from the obvious moral issues, child pornography is illegal in Canada — creating it, distributing it, and accessing it are all against the law. But a mandatory blacklist implemented at the ISP level is not the solution, for a whole bunch of reasons.

First off, there’s the question of effectiveness. As any good librarian can tell you, Filters Don’t Work. The history of internet filtering is rife with false positives and false negatives — sites get blocked when they shouldn’t be, and sites that should be blocked get missed. This system is going to miss out on a ton of child porn sites; inevitably, people are going to find the ones that haven’t been blacklisted yet. To an extent, false positives aren’t a big deal, since most people don’t encounter kiddie porn online to begin with and this initiative will make it even less likely. It’s also true that those who really want to get the stuff will find ways to circumvent Cleanfeed — even the RCMP have admitted that. So this is really just a way of protecting those of us who don’t want to be exposed to child porn.

I’m okay with that. But what about the false positives? What happens when sites get blacklisted by mistake? Michael Geist notes that there will be an appeal process, and also mentions that the blacklist will be kept secret to prevent it from doubling as a child porn directory. However, Cory Doctorow argues that this approach is flawed. There are several problems: a secret blacklist makes it hard to figure out that you’re being blocked like this; many non-Canadian website owners won’t go to the trouble of appealing — even if they figure out they’ve been blacklisted, which is unlikely; and even for Canadians, if they manage to find out what’s wrong, the appeal process can be a huge obstacle. (Cory, who has been a victim of wrongful blacklisting in the past, gives a great example of this last problem.)

Then there’s the question of precedent. At the moment, as I understand it, Canadian ISPs essentially bear no responsibility for the lawfulness of the content they transmit. (The full story is a bit more complicated, but for the purposes of this discussion that’s how things stand.) They can’t be sued for what their clients choose to look at or make available, and they don’t have to monitor or regulate the content that passes through their systems — in fact, they’re apparently not allowed to block access to content that doesn’t break the law. This is good for privacy (because the ISPs have no reason to monitor what you look at online), good for free speech, and good for the ISPs’ bottom lines. But now the ISPs are assuming the role of content watchdog, and that opens the door to pressure for increased access restrictions. How long will it be before we start seeing proposals, from either the government or the less civil-libertarian elements of the public, for blacklisting other types of objectionable content?

Now, to be fair, Michael Geist says that child pornography is a special case because of its legal status (it’s more restricted than anything else, even hate speech), and that it’s unlikely ISPs will start blocking other content. Dr. Geist knows what he’s talking about, so I’m willing to take a benefit-of-the-doubt stance. But on the other hand, it’s not like ISPs are bastions of intellectual freedom. In fact, we’ve already seen one major ISP block access to a website set up by its union — and, inadvertently, 766 unrelated sites (PDF) — during a lockout, purely because it didn’t like the content of the site. So if the pressure mounts for other blacklists beyond child porn — well, I for one won’t be surprised if the ISPs give in.

Finally, there’s the underlying assumption that this is something that should be imposed by the ISPs. There is a basic philosophical problem here. It’s not exactly censorship in the traditional sense that’s the issue — it’s not like, in Canada, child porn is protected speech and people have a right to look at it if they want to (it’s not, and they don’t). I’m saying that it’s wrong for ISPs to be doing this, because of their particular role in the transmission of information. ISPs are not content providers but access providers. To put it another way, it’s not their job to choose what content they make available; it’s their job to provide access to the content that others have chosen to make available. It sounds like a minor distinction, but it’s not — it means that those who control our ability to communicate online will now be in a position to choose, based on what we have to say, whether others get to hear us. Giving ISPs a veto over the content they transmit is inherently a major structural change in the free flow of information in this country, and the potential for adverse consequences is too great to ignore.

(I’ve linked several times to the excellent discussion of Project Cleanfeed Canada on Michael Geist’s blog. The comments touch on more aspects of the initiative than I’ve been able to cover here. The whole discussion is highly recommended.)

UPDATE, 4 December 2006: Michael Geist has written a Toronto Star column on Cybertip.ca. He addresses some of the concerns that have been raised, noting, for example, that there will be an appeals process with an independent review mechanism. Dr. Geist also mentions the slippery-slope issue, but concludes that despite some potential risks, “the project deserves the benefit of the doubt.”

As I said earlier, I’m willing to give Cybertip.ca the benefit of the doubt. They’re showing every sign of good faith (although it would be nice to see more information on the initiative on their website), and they are clearly responding to some of the potential pitfalls of their approach. However, several grave concerns still haven’t been adequately addressed:

• The accessibility of the appeals process is still an open question. How exactly will the process work? Does Cybertip.ca notify the site administrator when a site is blacklisted? How will Cybertip.ca ensure that the appeals process is open to everyone, including anonymous site owners and non-Canadians?
• The ISPs are still setting a bad precedent. Dr. Geist feels that the benefits of the initiative outweigh the risks of seeing the blacklist expanded to other types of content. But we’ve already seen that ISPs can’t be relied on to stand up for intellectual freedom, and I for one don’t think that the unique legal status of child pornography makes for a reliable safeguard.
• After all is said and done, this is still a case of ISPs regulating content — tentatively and at arm’s length, I know, but that’s still what they’re doing, and it’s a historically new role for them (at least in Canada) and a structural change in the flow of information online. That’s cause enough to be concerned.

From the Canadian Press:

Ottawa is exploring the possibility of allowing the private sector to finance and operate a new border crossing at Canada’s busiest point of entry to the United States, Trade and Infrastructure Minister Lawrence Cannon said Monday.

The clear signal that the federal government is entertaining private involvement in a second bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ont., comes amid new polling data that suggests nearly two-thirds of Canadians support the idea of public-private partnerships.

The poll in question was commissioned by the Canadian Council for Public-Private Partnerships, and you can read it for yourself, if you like. It’s quite the piece of work. Apparently these are the questions they asked:

1. Governments are having trouble keeping pace with demands for new or improved public infrastructure and services. Do you agree or disagree?
2. It is time to allow the private sector to deliver these types of services in partnership with governments. Do you agree or disagree?
3. If your access to services remained the same, if the quality of services was the same or better and if the cost to you was no more than if the government was providing the service, would you support or oppose private sector involvement in the following areas: [and a bunch of service sectors are listed].

Aren’t access, quality of services, and cost three of the key issues surrounding privatization? (They also left out accountability, which to my mind would be the fourth.) How can you trust a poll that dodges those issues? And yet the Canadian Press story pretty much ignores the evident bias here. Sure, it quotes a union boss saying that the survey is “very short on questions that relate to access, cost and quality concerns,” but the reporter doesn’t follow that up — instead, the poll results are discussed as if they were reliable.

Also worth noting:

Security at the border crossing would continue to be the domain of Canadian and American border agencies, said David McFadden, chairman of communications for The Canadian Council for Public-Private Partnerships.

“What the private sector does is maintain the infrastructure, make sure it’s properly paved, cleaned, things of that nature,” McFadden said.

Let’s hope they stick to that. I’m not holding my breath, though: the article goes on to point out that Cannon “did say that a private-sector partner could ‘operate’ the crossing.” It would be nice if they could at least get their stories straight.