ArsTechnica is reporting on the practice of altering and editing web-traffic enroute from the server to your client/browser. Is your ISP, work or connection path altering your requested documents? Find out here.
posted by loquacious on Apr 16, 2008 - 18 comments

We're only two weeks into the year, but net neutrality issues hit the ground running. The FCC already has three different inquiries open. (also) (previously) The 700 Mhz auction threatens to disrupt an already converging telecom industry. AT&T's post-merger commitment to net neutrality ends this year, and they plan to test the filtering waters, despite recently opposing the practice. And today, a leaked memo revealed that Time Warner will test tiered internet services soon. The Internet as we know it, and communications in general, might be headed for some major changes in 2008.
posted by spiderwire on Jan 16, 2008 - 20 comments

It's been there since 2001. The debate continues: is netauthority.org legitimate or a hoax? If it's a hoax, it's one of the most successful web hoaxes of all time. People are still falling for it. (previously)
posted by metasonix on Jul 4, 2007 - 20 comments

How Many Ways Can You Spell V1@gra? Building on previous research (Cockerham, 2004), Brian Hayes attempts to find the limits of Viagra-spammer ingenuity.
posted by Horace Rumpole on Jun 27, 2007 - 17 comments

Cass Sunstein's The Future of Free Speech

"I seek to defend a particular conception of democracy — a deliberative conception — and to evaluate, in its terms, the outcome of a system with perfect power of filtering."
posted by Kwantsar on Sep 13, 2004 - 9 comments

Iran systematically filters political websites: In contrast with what the Iranaian President had said in the UN summit on Information Technology last year, the OpenNet Initiative, in its latest bulletin, concludes that "Iran is indeed engaged in extensive Internet content filtering beyond just pornography, including many political, religious, social, and blogging websites.
"Most of these censored websites are Iran-specific; very little non-pornographic, "global" content is filtered from Iranian users. "
posted by hoder on Aug 19, 2004 - 8 comments

Spammers strike back? Well then call this return of the Webmaster Jedi. As a blogger and domain owner, I am sick of waking up to fifty new comments, all of which are spam for something of dubious legality. The fine folks at Kalsey are angry too. And they declared war. Lots of people stood up and took notice. What can you do to help stop this infestation? Blacklists and Bayesian filtering come to mind... (Via Smart Mobs)
posted by swerdloff on Nov 11, 2003 - 22 comments

Can "blocking software" companies be sued? This is interesting. The Register (a respected if somewhat snide computer industry online rag) has somehow managed to land on Cyber Patrol's block list as a "sex site". Now they're conducting something called an ABCe audit and they're making nasty noises about "restraint of trade". Which makes me wonder if they're thinking "lawsuit".

The blocking-software companies have been using rather broad brushes in making their blocking lists. Although some claim that any site they block is checked by a human first, with thousands of new sites appearing every day there simply isn't any way. Peacefire has documented hundreds of sites which were blocked inappropriately. I am pretty certain that under US law that blockees have no recourse -- but perhaps the law in the EU is different. Anyone over there care to comment? Is it plausible that an "ABCe audit" could result in a lawsuit? (I'd really love to see a few high profile big-bucks lawsuits here.)
posted by Steven Den Beste on Mar 8, 2001 - 9 comments

Censorware.org one of the best censorware pages, has died. "Due to demands from some of the people who contributed, in however minor a fashion, to this site, it has been taken down." Dagnabit! Anybody have any idea why? The site had one of the neatest pages on the net, estimated how fast it was going to show how impossible it was to keep up. Free spxxch loses an important defender.
posted by mrmorgan on Jan 30, 2001 - 0 comments

Winners of the Foil the Filters Contest.
posted by quirked on Sep 28, 2000 - 3 comments