@freezenet Skimming it, some things jump out:
"content that advocates self-harm, disordered eating or dying by suicide or that counsels a person to commit or engage in any of those acts"
Would euthanasia fall under that?
"if it is reasonable to suspect"
From "content used to bully a child". At scale in particular, what would that mean?
It appears to conflate some erotic literature / porn with victimization, even if the person being "victimized" does not exist. There appears to be a vague "artistic" exception, but I don't think that is sufficient (and it is constrained by vague "risks").
6 1 In theory, the legislation does not appear to apply to private messaging contexts?
55 1 "The operator of a regulated service must implement measures that are adequate to mitigate the risk that users of the service will be exposed to harmful content on the service."
"91 (1) Subject to subsection 92(1), an inspector may, for a purpose related to verifying compliance or preventing non-compliance with this Act, enter any place in which they have reasonable grounds to believe that there is any document, information or other thing relevant to that purpose."
7 2 It partially allows for mandating upload filters and other such things (a "Commission" appears to be responsible for dictating this).
Those bits might be of interest, although there are probably other things in there.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/02/eff-statement-nevadas-attack-end-end-encryption
"EFF learned last week that the state of Nevada is seeking an emergency order prohibiting Meta from rolling out end-to-end encryption in Facebook Messenger for all users in the state under the age of 18."
"Encryption is the most vital means we have to protect privacy, which is especially important for young people online. Yet in the name of protecting children, Nevada seems to be arguing that merely offering encryption on a social media platform that Meta knows has been used by criminals is itself illegal. This cannot be the law; in practice it would let the state prohibit all platforms from offering encryption, and such a ruling would raise serious constitutional concerns."
🚨🚨 The UK government is trying to give itself more surveillance powers without regard for our right to privacy
The Investigatory Powers Amendment Bill, which is currently making its way through Parliament, is the latest power grab.
Its most concerning proposals could allow the intelligence services to harvest millions of facial images and social media data.
@SirTapTap Damn it, I've seen that manga before with the marine creatures with those weird things attached to them, but the name is always slipping my mind x.x
They also conflate real content with fantasy content, rely on misleading misrepresentations of the effects on porn, and typically, people like this conflate animated violence with realistic violence, and mild "aggression" with what might more typically be viewed as "aggression". To put it simply, it is a mess, and extremely problematic.
As it turns out though, they're looking for submissions. #ukpol
If you're curious about the sorts of people who push for these sorts of things, one who appeared before parliamentarians is the U.K.-based Vice-President of an American bunch of Christian fundamentalists known as NCOSE (formerly known as Morality in Media)*, Haley McNamara.
These politicians also voice "concern" about something, then they push for broader censorship than that. For instance, this "baroness" appears to be looking to censor vast swathes of content. It is an extreme attack on free expression.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Center_on_Sexual_Exploitation
#ukpol
I suppose since the British government is at great risk of becoming puritanical fascists (if they're not already), as evidenced by the above meeting, I should repost my "porn isn't bad" science / knowledge pack* for #ukpol.
https://www.freespeechcoalition.com/blog/fsc-meets-with-baroness-conducting-review-of-uk-pornography-laws The Free Speech Coalition (no, not the one you are thinking of, the other one) meets puritanical anti-porn Tory appointee* who wants to censor porn in the #UK.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabrielle_Bertin%2C_Baroness_Bertin
https://web.archive.org/web/20240218013044/https://legislature.vermont.gov/bill/status/2024/S.289 #KOSA-like censorship bill introduced in Vermont. #AADC
@thenexusofprivacy We have (optional) local only posts here. I think Misskey also has it. Dunno about vanilla Mastodon though. From what I recall, Rochko is usually a bit fussy about what he adds.
Local only posts might also be useful in part of the porn federation (i.e. some of the 3D content).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KISS_principle
Following KISS, a small list does seem like a more elegant (and probably better) solution than a blacklist, for that particular use case. Probably depends on the execution.
Curiously, blahaj (don't know a whole lot about them tbh) appears to be an Australian instance (which can be a fairly puritanical country).
The puritanism comes from a typical source. The previous Prime Minister is said to have been friends with some guy who believes in QAnon, and he even made a speech about rituals in schools in the Parliament.
The PM was right wing, tended to be very authoritarian, and seemed very paranoid (he even secretly appointed himself to ministerial posts without the Ministers already in those posts knowing). He also believed he was chosen by God to lead the country.
The government would then take opinions from these, rather suspicious people, who seemed either conspiratorial / QAnon-like (one even harassed sexologists who had views they didn't like), or someone who literally spoke of wanting to ban all porn, and whose feed was filled with American Christian fundamentalists with similar views.
Crucially, they didn't really seem to know what they were talking about, and leaned on that dehumanizing type language.
The government then presented their views as if they were "neutral" or relevant. They appear to have made quite a mess of the public discourse there (or it was a bit ago). In 2021, a senior government official even got caught making an appearance on NCOSE's podcast (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Center_on_Sexual_Exploitation) which is known to be a rebranded group of American Christian fundamentalists, all while ignoring censorship / privacy concerns.
Well, that is probably useful to keep in mind, otherwise might encounter something without understanding any of it. On the upside, the PM lost the last election.
@alecmuffett It seems then that they said "Yes, it absolutely does", then quibbled about the definition of "age verification", and said, "Therefore, it does not". Then, they wonder why people think they're political stooges, when they seem to be trying to split hairs to come to a particular conclusion. They're also wrong. You could easily see arguments being made in court that "Company X isn't doing a good enough job." You don't even need to be a legal scholar to see that.
Even the way they do things doesn't seem that effective, they seem to hyper-focus on trying to debunk specific claims, rather than trying to debunk, say, QAnon as a cultural phenomena...
@SarahOestreich That sounds like a recipe for discrimination, and it probably hides it behind a black box that is harder to understand.
@timbray @inventor @taylorlorenz It's hard to really capture and describe her, if I had to though, I'd say that she is QAnon for all the other things.
She is a dangerous one, not least because of the "they're coming to get you!" type mentality going on there.
Software Engineer. Psy / Tech / Sex Science Enthusiast. Controversial?
Free Expression. Human rights / Civil Liberties. Anime. Liberal.