Hasta La Gadget!

Just last week, California created a law that would classify “revenge porn” as a criminal misdemeanor, and it looks like New York lawmakers also want to make a stand against this kind of thing. Unlike California though, New York is looking to include photos taken by the subject as being a part of their stand against revenge porn. (more…)

Revenge Porn Ban Being Considered By New York Lawmakers original content from Ubergizmo.

It’s everyone’s favorite time of year—the birds are chirping, the bees are buzzing, and PornHub has just released a big, ol’ sticky mess of data about the country’s porn habits. And the conclusion? The MILF is alive and well, Nevada is weirdly into adult film star Anita Queen, and anyone invested in the porn industry needn’t worry—America says "yes" to porn.

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Stealing computers is bad—everybody already knows that. And stealing from a church (or any non-profit institution for that matter) is extra bad. But if you must steal a computer from a church—especially one you’re a member of—don’t call up the software blocking company and ask if they’ll remove the porn filter. As Troy Ridling of Owasso, Oklahoma found out the hard way, you’re not going to like the answer.

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Authorities in the UK have never had quite the same level of anxiety over Huawei that we’ve witnessed in the US, and they’ve so far been happy to let the Chinese firm get involved with numerous parts of the country’s data infrastructure. As it turns out, the company’s control even extends to the “Homesafe” filter used by internet service provider TalkTalk, which David Cameron recently praised during his push for tighter controls on adult content. The BBC discovered that UK-based Huawei employees are able to decide which sites are blocked on TalkTalk’s service, and that even users who opt out of Homesafe have their internet usage data routed through Huawei’s system. Whether or not this is an issue depends entirely on how much you trust reports of close ties between Huawei and the Chinese government, versus Huawei’s claim that these concerns are based on anti-Chinese prejudice rather than evidence. From a purely practical point of view, however, if the mission is to block off huge swathes of the internet, why wouldn’t you hire an expert?

Update: A representative of Huawei has been in touch to provide the company’s side of the story. He said that Huawei doesn’t “run” the Homesafe system, but that the system is “supported by Huawei” without Huawei having control over it. He added that Huawei does not decide which sites are blocked, and that the final decision as to what filters are implemented rests with TalkTalk. Meanwhile, the BBC is apparently standing by its story, since it has issued no retraction.

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Source: BBC News

British Prime Minister David Cameron announced a sweeping set of reforms on Monday that seeks to limit access to online pornography and do away with the more obscene materials. In a speech, Cameron outlined a new filter system that will compel all British internet users to select whether or not they want family-friendly filters in place on their accounts. Blimey.

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