Internet is now essential but…2

THIS FLOW of information is enabled and made available by Telecommunications Corporations or Internet Server Providers (ISPs). The public pays them to be connected to the Internet. They are not liable for what passes through their servers but they should stop dangerous and illegal content like child abuse images. It is like they own a building where the public gather in the lobby and the ISPs allow toxic poison to pass through day and night.

The vilest abuse of the Internet is when it is used to share images of children being abused. The I nterne t Service Providers ( ISPs) worldwide should be held responsible by law to install software on their servers to block all child abuse images.

In the UK, it is the NGO Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) that does this for the UK-based ISPs and share with many organizations worldwide the result of their work finding child abuse images. However, since all ISPs are connected through the Internet, all have a collective responsibility to install the blocking software and stop the child abuse images entering their severs.

If all used the existing blocking software, the evil can be greatly reduced if not eliminated. The IWF can’t do it all. The ISPs, at least, should sign on and join their service.

The IWF can find many web pages and sites hosting child abuse images and remove them. IWF told this column, “Our approach has seen the percentage of child sexual abuse material ( CSAM) content hosted in the UK decline from 18 percent in 1996 to less than 0.15 percent in 2019, making the UK a very hostile place to share CSAM content online.”

How about the rest of the world? The ISPs everywhere should be doing this, too. IWF has shown the way.

Microsoft has devel oped effective softwares, PhotoDNA and VideoDNA, to do this and offers it free of charge. It is effectively used by Internet Watch Foundation. The I SPs everywhere should install this software.

In the UK, Lord Raymond Hylton raised the issue in Parliament. A new law in the UK, Online Safety Bill, will establish “Duty of Care.” This will hold telecommunication corporations liable for any content that would harm users.

In the Philippines the law requires the ISPs to install the software since 2009 but they have resisted to do so and perhaps pay a small fine instead. This law is being reviewed. PLDT/ Smart has signed up to get on the recipient list of the IWF.

The IWF has identified more than 9,000 sites containing CSAM and all ISPs can now block them if they install the blocking software to do so.

But will they or is this just a public relations stunt? Microsoft has told this column that PLDT/ Smart has not yet t aken t he Microsoft blocking software.

So the challenge is out there for the ISPs to find a moral conscience, to obey existing laws and take voluntary action to protect children online. ( preda. org)/