The MPAA has been engaged in an ongoing legal battle with torrent search engine IsoHunt, where a court ordered IsoHunt to wave a magic wand and block all infringement based on an MPAA list of what has to be blocked. This is pretty stupid for a variety of reasons. Hell, back in the Napster case over a decade ago, the judge made a similar requirement only to learn that filters suck for this kind of thing. There are two reasons for this: (1) they don't do a very good job blocking infringing content, and (2) they always block legitimate content. While those two things may sound contradictory, they're not. When such blocks go into place, people who really want to share unauthorized content quickly work out ways around the filters, whether it's some sort of shorthand that avoids the filters or with some other simple to decipher system. Yet, for content that wants to be found, there's no need for such basic obfuscation, and then the legit content gets blocked. In fact, last year we wrote about legitimate content being blocked.

And it's still happening today. Even as the MPAA is claiming that IsoHunt has constructed its filter to still let people infringe, there are reports coming out about how ridiculously broad and stupid the filter is, such that plenty of legitimate and authorized content is getting caught and blocked. It appears, for reasons that make no sense, the MPAA has more or less made IsoHunt set up blanket blocks on certain terms, no matter how generic:

This week artist Elliot Wallace found out that the music he shares with a Creative Commons license is blocked for U.S. visitors. Those who try to download his two track album “The Spirit Truth” will see the following error message.

“Torrent has been censored, as required by US court.”

Needless to say, Wallace doesn’t want his music to be blocked. However, one of his tracks is titled “In the Kingdom of the Undead” which contains “The Kingdom,” a combination of words which the MPAA deems infringing.

TorrentFreak goes on to note that this single filter item of "the kingdom" has resulted in a whole bunch of authorized content getting blocked:

For example, legitimate torrents blocked by “The Kingdom” phrase include an album with Reggaeton music, a selection of sermons preached at the North Main Church of Christ and a live concert from Uncle Earl. All these files are also hosted on the Internet Archive and can be shared freely.

And that's just a single phrase. There are many others, some of which the article highlights.

Meanwhile, I'm curious if anyone actually thinks this is making someone do such a search and then go give money to an MPAA-associated studio? I find that doubtful.

Now that Sarkozy has been thrown out of office, France is no longer producing the steady stream of bad proposals for the Internet that it once generated. That has left an opening for some other country to take its place, and it seems that Russia is keen to pick up where Sarkozy left off. We've been reporting on previous worrying developments there, and TorrentFreak has news on another one:

According to information obtained by Vedomosti, publishers of music, books and software have put forward amendments [to Russia's existing anti-piracy law] which will place a huge burden of responsibility not just on regular websites but also on search engines such as Google and local outfit Yandex.

The proposed amendments center around the creation of a national registry listing all music, software and books. This database will then be made available to search engines and site owners who will be required to consult it before servicing their users with links or content.

The idea is to create a huge whitelist of approved sites holding copyright materials, and Web sites and search engines will be obliged to use it when linking to works requested by users. As we reported back in February, one region was planning to try that approach in order to produce a "clean Internet." That's clearly impossible, and so is the latest proposal -- both in terms putting together a complete whitelist, and trying to refer to it. As Yandex is quoted as saying in the TorrentFreak piece, the idea could have a wider chilling effect on real-time discussions online:

"[If the amendments go through], rightsholders will switch the entire Internet into pre-moderation mode, because sites can not accommodate any comment without full verification of all the materials located on the link in this comment. For the bulk of services, this task is impossible," Yandex concludes.

And it's not hard to see where this approach leads: replacing today's blacklists of sites that are blocked -- child pornography being the most obvious category -- to one of whitelists, which show the approved sites that aren't blocked. That's truly frightening, and not just for Russian users. As we've seen time and again, governments around the world have the awful habit of copying each other's ideas when it comes to regulating the Internet -- but usually only the bad ones. If this approach is brought in, it can only be a matter of time before people start calling for the same in other countries, citing Russia as an example of where it has already been implemented.

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UK Prime Minister David Cameron's anti-porn activities have been well detailed here recently, including his insistence that search engines enable child pornography and that ISP-level porn filtering should be on by default. Despite lacking the comprehension of the technology he's regulating or the inherent limitations of his proposals, Cameron has boldly moved on into the porn-free future, all the while claiming these moves have nothing to do with government censorship.

(We can also start taking bets on whether "opting in" to porn [by contacting your ISP and asking to be placed on the perv list] will have an effect on UK divorce rates -- after all, the filtering begins at the pipe and isn't something you can have available on some devices but not others. Let the awkward conversations begin!)

There's no censorship here, Cameron claims, while touting the porn filtering wonders of Homesafe, a filtering system built by TalkTalk and... Huawei.

On Monday the Prime Minister said TalkTalk had shown "great leadership" in setting up its system, Homesafe, which it has offered to customers since 2011.

TalkTalk told the BBC it was comfortable with its relationship with Huawei, and that the service was very popular.

Homesafe is a voluntary scheme which allows subscribers to select categories - including social media, gambling and pornography - that they want blocked.

Customers who do not want filtering still have their traffic routed through the system, but matches to Huawei's database are dismissed rather than acted upon.

That's right. Huawei, a Chinese firm, is performing the actual filtering for UK web traffic. No one knows filtering better than the originators of the Internet Great Firewall, and even though Huawei is not a state-run company, due to its nationality, there will always be questions as to its overall allegiance. Huawei, to its credit, has been very open about its operations and has invited critics, including the US government itself, to investigate it if it thinks Huawei's such a threat to national security.

The UK government has had its own issues with Huawei.

But Huawei's position was recently the subject of an Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) report. It criticised the lack of ministerial oversight over the firm's rapid expansion in the UK.

The committee said "the alleged links between Huawei and the Chinese State are concerning, as they generate suspicion as to whether Huawei's intentions are strictly commercial or are more political" - but added that it had not found any evidence of wrongdoing.

So, it's more or less above board, apparently. Should UK citizens be concerned their web traffic is being filtered by a company from a filter-heavy nation? Or should they be more concerned that control over content is being handed to a third-party private corporation rather than an independent organization that would be ultimately accountable to Parliament? Either way, it doesn't seem like this revelation will endear the new filtering system to the British public.

TalkTalk certainly recognizes the potential downside of this relationship as is evidenced by some earlier tap dancing it did around the subject.

Initially, TalkTalk told the BBC that it was US security firm Symantec that was responsible for maintaining its blacklist, and that Huawei only provided the hardware, as previously reported.

However, Symantec said that while it had been in a joint venture with Huawei to run Homesafe in its early stages, it had not been involved for over a year.

TalkTalk later confirmed it is Huawei that monitors activity, checking requests against its blacklist of over 65 million web addresses, and denying access if there is a match.

Interesting. While it's unfair to declare Huawei synonymous with the Chinese government, it's not unfair to question why the politicians pushing for this filtering system weren't more concerned about who would be handling the dirty job and perhaps steered the monitoring away from a contractor that would give the system the appearance of being more censorious than it is already.

But not to worry, Cameron's keeping an eye on the whole thing:

Mr Cameron said that the actions of ISPs would be monitored to ensure filtering is done correctly.

What.

The ISPs are being forced to implement this filtering. They're not in charge of "doing" the filtering. The actual filtering is being done by third parties, one of which is a Chinese company. It looks as if Cameron's more concerned ISPs might treat some customers like adults and flip the switch without making them fill out the appropriate "I HEART PORN" paperwork (which may include divorce papers), or just wants to be in a position to pounce if someone's underage eyes catch a glimpse of x-rated skin.

Giving the appearance that the UK government is hiring censors to help with its censorship apparently isn't as much of a concern.

We've had a few posts now about UK Prime Minister David Cameron's nutty idea to censor the internet with an unworkable porn filter (complete with a "porn license" so that if you want to get around the filter, you have to "register" your desire not to be censored). Of course, this all makes perfect fodder for musician Dan Bull, whose music we've featured plenty of times. His specialty areas tend to be songs about politicians, internet freedom and video games. This one hits on two of the three, so here he is with his open letter to David Cameron, the Porn Minister.

Once the UK recording industry realized that UK courts would order ISPs to block websites it didn't like, it appears that the industry, led by BPI and PPL began putting together a list of over two dozen sites that they're asking to have blocked by all UK ISPs, even though many of the sites on the list have never been tried in a court of law or convicted of copyright infringement. Included on the list, for example, is Grooveshark, who has been sued, but has not yet been found to violate copyright laws. It may very well be true that there is infringement on many, if not all of those sites. But, generally speaking, there's this thing called due process that allows a site to defend itself before being censored from an entire country. Just because a site has some infringing content does not mean that the entire site should be blocked -- or you'd have absolutely no user generated content sites online, because the liability would be too high. The UK courts started down this slippery slope by allowing sites to be blocked, and now the record labels are just going to keep piling the list higher and higher.

We all enjoyed a loud, incredulous laugh when Janet Napolitano, Homeland Security Secretary, went on record as being proudly computer illiterate. "Never use email," she said as part of statement delivered by teletype. Perhaps Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan should have chosen the Luddite Way, thus avoiding his current problems. Instead, he chose to perform the digital equivalent of plugging his ears and shouting nonsensical syllables at the top of his lungs in order to actively ignore news he didn't want to hear (found via the essential Police Misconduct Reporting Project).

People who've e-mailed Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan over the past year about Occupy Oakland probably didn't get much of a response.

That's because he used a spam filter to dismiss messages sent to him with "Occupy Oakland" in the subject line, according to a federal court filing Monday. Same goes for the phrases "stop the excessive police force," "respect the press pass" or "police brutality." Instead of landing in his in-box, those messages went straight into his junk mail folder, which he apparently never looked at.

It's tough work being Chief. A steady stream of complaints about the police force under your "control" is sure to be disheartening. But, if you can't take the heat, reroute it out the nearest opening, am I right? And he would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn't for that meddling federal court monitor.

Because of those filters, Jordan missed e-mails from other city officials and a federal court monitor, who oversees the department's compliance with court-ordered reforms stemming from a police abuse scandal.

Robert Warshaw, the monitor, had sent Jordan an e-mail with the subject line "Disciplinary Actions-Occupy Oakland." Jordan told the court on Oct. 18 that he never saw those e-mails, infuriating Thelton Henderson, the federal judge in San Francisco who appointed Warshaw.

Oops. Ignoring the persistent chatter of unhappy citizens is one thing. Ignoring a federal judge is quite another. While you can safely ignore some of the people all of the time, you can't really ignore all of the people all of the time. You can attempt it, but then you end up in "unprecedented" territory, which is never a good place to be if you value your career.

Henderson will hear arguments in December about whether to place the Police Department into the hands of a federal receiver, which Oakland officials believe is unprecedented.

When you've mismanaged your post so badly that the police department ends up in receivership via a court order, you've probably done more than filter out anything resembling bad news. A year of unread email certainly didn't improve the ongoing compliance issue. The handling of "Occupy Oakland" didn't instill any confidence in the public that their law enforcement officials were there to serve and protect. Henderson's willful rerouting of email pertaining to allegations of excessive force and brutality shows a very ugly contempt for the citizens under his protection. Of course, now that the truth has come out, he has a few excuses.

He had been inundated with anonymous messages, he said in a declaration to the court.

Well, of course. Anonymity is a key ingredient in any protest. Being inundated with messages you don't like doesn't grant you the permission to revise the incoming narrative by dumping anything negative into the trash. The excuse continues:

But he forgot the e-mail filter was still in effect.

It's an easy thing to forget if you find painting a self-portrait on rose-tinted glass preferable to actually dealing with problems in the community and, indeed, within the ranks of your own force. The brain has many wonderful tricks its willing to play on you to provide you with the short term memory and justification needed to "forget" your determined pruning of incoming messages.

"It was never my intention to ignore the monitor," Jordan said in his declaration.

No. I'm sure it wasn't. You had no desire to piss off a federal judge. But it was your intention to ignore the general public, a fact that goes unacknowledged by this pitiful statement attempting to pass itself off as some sort of an apology. Turning your incoming mail into a "yes-man" approximation is just plain sad.

In yet another example of overactive copyright law blocking legitimate content, we find this story from Marco Arment, creator of Instapaper, about Zazzle's abrupt and unfriendly treatment of its supposedly (but not actually) infringing customers.

Marco, who is no stranger to copyright concerns, recently used Zazzle to sell a jokey mug based on bad reviews of Instapaper:

Later in the day, after the mug had racked up 116 sales, all the customers were told that their orders had been cancelled because the mug violates Zazzle's acceptable use policy—apparently the "design contains an image or text that may be subject to copyright."

May be subject to copyright? Anything and everything may be subject to copyright. If that's the bar they're using to determine what's allowed on Zazzle, nothing will exist there at all. Besides, usually when you come across something that may have a problem you check to find out if it actually does. But that's not what happened here.

Meanwhile, Marco himself got nothing—Zazzle gave him no explanation at all. Of course, it's important to pick your battles, and even though Marco knows damn well there's no issue of this "maybe" infringing (there is no infringement), he has no intention of fighting this. Instead he's opted to send a message on his (quite popular) blog:

"Now I just know that Zazzle sucks, and I’ll never do business with them again."

And, because Zazzle may suck, perhaps you won't want to do business with them either.

It's not entirely clear what led to Zazzle cancel the orders, but since Marco was never informed about a complaint, it was probably an automated filter, possibly with some lax human review. But computers aren't very good at identifying copyright infringement, and neither are most people‐not even rightsholders themselves. That's not really surprising, since copyright law is insanely complex, but online services that feature user-generated content still face all sorts of pressure from various industries, insisting they somehow magically detect and stop all infringement. Some cooperate, so you end up with overactive filters that inevitably block all sorts of legitimate content—then you end up with rightfully pissed off customers complaining in public.

The contentious nature of the "three strikes" response to unauthorized sharing of copyright materials can be seen by the legal battles being fought around it across Europe. That's particularly the case in Ireland, which has emerged as a key testing ground for the approach and its legality.

Back in 2009, the IFPI sued the ISP Eircom for copyright infringement, and the latter settled by agreeing to implement a three strikes policy. The Irish Recorded Music Association then started sending letters to other Irish ISPs demanding they do the same. One Irish judge approved the three strikes approach, but another judge ruled ISPs were under no legal obligation to implement it.

And now we have the latest twist in this continuing saga: Eircom has been ordered to halt its three strikes scheme in a ruling by the Irish Data Protection Commissioner because of concerns about users' privacy. This follows an investigation that was triggered by the earlier incident in which Eircom sent out first warning letters to innocent account holders.

However, this is by no means the end of the story. The Irish government is now considering how to plug perceived gaps in existing laws:

Minister of State for Enterprise Seán Sherlock is to publish an order early in the new year that is expected to allow music publishers, film producers and other parties to go to court to prevent internet service providers from allowing their customers access to pirate websites.

But as usual, the recording industry's demands are for ever-more extreme powers:

EMI Ireland recently warned the Government that it would take legal action against the State if the Government did not address the problem.

Its chief executive, Willie Kavanagh, is not ruling out going ahead with this if the statutory order does not give companies such as his a clear right to seek court injunctions against internet service providers that allow access to music and video piracy websites.

This attempt to pressure a national government into changing the law for the convenience of a group of companies unwilling to move with the times is troubling. The logical conclusion of this kind of thinking is to turn ISPs into the content industry's private police force, letting the former do the dirty work and get the blame, while the latter sit back and enjoy the benefits of their monopoly pricing.

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Safe drinking water is often taken for granted, but having it is obviously fundamentally important for any community to survive and thrive. There are a lot of different ways to purify water, but the trick is to do it cheaply with available materials. Here are a few interesting links on good old H₂O.

• Specially-treated sand can (cheaply!) purify water for drinking. Can't wait for DIY versions to replace Brita filters... [url]
• Leaving water in PET plastic bottles to soak up some UV sun rays can kill harmful organisms in a few hours. This is how at least 5 million people disinfect their drinking water in 30 different countries.... [url]
• Apparently, bottled water sold in the US could use some more transparent labeling. And US tap water needs a better marketing team. [url]
• NASA is working on a way to let astronauts drink their own pee safely. Yum, urine simulants! [url]
• To discover more food-related links, check out what's floating around at StumbleUpon. [url]  

By the way, StumbleUpon can also recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.