Google-NAMBLA?

[Babbler]

Suit accuses Google of profiting from child porn

By Anne Broache
http://news.com.com/Suit+accuses+Google+of+profiting+from+child+porn/2100-1030_3-6069014.html

Story last modified Fri May 05 10:49:03 PDT 2006

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Google has made child pornography an "obscenely profitable and integral part" of its business and must be stopped, a new lawsuit claims.

Jeffrey Toback, a Democratic representative in New York's Nassau County Legislature, charged in a complaint filed Thursday that Google has been taking in billions of dollars by allowing child pornography and "other obscene content" operators to advertise their sites through sponsored links, which are tailored to a user's search terms and automatically accompany search results. The suit was filed in the New York Supreme Court.

Among other allegations, the complaint evoked the politically volatile topic of the search engine's dealings in China.

"Defendant is willing to accede to the demands of the Chinese autocrats to block the search term 'democracy,'" the complaint states, "but when it comes to the protection and well-being of our nation's innocent children, Defendant refuses to spend a dime's worth of resources to block child pornography from reaching children."

A Google representative said Friday that the company prohibits child pornography in its products and removes all such content whenever the company finds or is made aware of it. "We also report it to the appropriate law enforcement officials and fully cooperate with the law enforcement community to combat child pornography," spokesman Steve Langdon said in an e-mail.

Langdon pointed to the content policy for Google's AdWords sponsored links service, which broadly prohibits "promotion of child pornography or other non-consensual material." Langdon also noted that Google offers a filtering tool called SafeSearch that aims to block offensive content in search results.

The availability of such tools could mean that the suit may not go far. Section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act protects providers and users of an "interactive computer service" from liability if it can be shown that they took good-faith measures to restrict access to obscene material. It also provides that "no provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider."

The suit, which claims Google acted negligently and intentionally inflicted emotional distress on the public, requests monetary damages to be determined at trial. It also accuses Google of violating federal statutes relating to child pornography and calls for the court to order that Google cease "advertising, promoting, or distributing" child pornography through its site or otherwise providing any links to such content.

The suit was filed by the White Plains, N.Y.-based firm of Meiselman, Denlea, Packman, Carton & Eberz. Other recent lawsuits filed by the firm have sought at least $10 million for alleged sex discrimination against Atlantic City, N.J., casino cocktail waitresses and $600 million from the maker of an ephedra-based dietary supplement claimed to cause the death of a Baltimore Orioles pitcher.

Toback, the politician backing the action, describes himself in his biography on Nassau County's Web site as a "quality of life guy" who has focused on legislation promoting open space and recreational areas. He has also co-sponsored a law designed to protect teenagers from tanning beds and has planned this year to pursue a ban of toy guns in the area.

The legal action against Google comes as Congress and the Bush administration have been attempting to step up their crackdown on online sexual exploitation of children. The Justice Department has proposed a mandatory labeling system for sites bearing sexually explicit content and higher penalties for Internet service providers that don't report child pornography on their networks to the appropriate authorities.


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Disturbing. Either way.

Either Google is profiting from child abuse or Toback wasting the time of the courts (why should toy guns be banned?).

 

[Xanikk999]

This whole lawsuit seems bogus to me. Its the inneffeciency of our court systems in taking cases that ties up court time for the real deals.

I dont think they will be able to present a good enough case though and it will probably be thrown out.

 

[Masquerouge]

Someone wants to piggyride the Google vs China train for fame.

 

[Bill3000]

I never saw any advertisement. Not even while googling "child porn"

 

[Neomega]

Great, the Democrats are already getting stupid. By election timethey will have become so arrogant, and think they can win by hating Bush alone, that they will have exposed themselves as teh left wing control freaks they are.

This lawsuit is ludicrous. NAMBLA does not have pictures of boys and men in sexual acts, so it is not child pronography. Child porn is only illegal because illegal acts are committed while creating it. Therefore, if an old man writes a long erotic stroy about molesting a 10 year old boy, it is legal, no matter how distasteful the American public at large finds it.

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

I never saw any advertisement. Not even while googling "child porn"

......I'm not quite sure what to say to that...

 

[Xanikk999]

......I'm not quite sure what to say to that...

You cant even find child porn when your looking for it.

Dont ask me how i know that i was just testing!

 

[Tenochtitlan]

However, isn't it an automated search algorithm?

Google, like a knife, is a tool. You can cut food, also stab.

 

[TheBladeRoden]

I bet Microsoft is behind it all...

 

[Riesstiu IV]

What is wrong with you people?! The National Association of Marlon Brando Look Alikes is a perfectly legitimate organization.

 

[Snow]

What is wrong with you people?! The National Association of Marlon Brando Look Alikes is a perfectly legitimate organization.

South Park Rulez!!!!!

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

What is wrong with you people?! The National Association of Marlon Brando Look Alikes is a perfectly legitimate organization.

I sure hope they win their battle against that other NAMBLA for the rights to NAMBLA.com.

 

[Erik Mesoy]

I counter the article with another article on why this lawsuit is MEADOW MUFFINS.

As usual for those with this agenda this prosecutor and his contituents, are
just grandstanding and conflating different issues.

First, they are claiming that all searches for terms like "child
pornography" would be ipso facto, attempts to procure such materials;
(rather than searches for legitimate information about things like law
enforcement techniques or criminological studies related to them).

Next they are implying that this is a significant portion of Google's business;
and that (somehow) it's disproportionate to the use of other search engines for
the same purposes. (I have to assume that those implications are wholly
unfounded).

Then they pull the same stunt as anti-pornography activists routinely employ ---
deliberately conflating the possible exposure of children to adult materials
(kids accessing porn sites) with "child pornography." The
exploitation of childen in the production of porn is a different issue then
whether some kid manages to sneak onto the net to view materials that were
creating for and by adults and only for adult consumption.

This last point is ongoing and deliberate because there is a segment of the
population that is disgusted by the idea that anyone, anywhere, can view
explicit sexual materials. They want to claim that such material pose a risk to
children if there is any chance that some child, somehwere, can be exposed to
it. (The slippery slopes should be obvious).

This simply amounts to the CDA all over again. (And starting with Google is
merely opportunistic).

Litigiation of this sort is like suing the Post Office for delivering the Unabomber's package.

 

[Xenocrates]

It looks like child porn is being used as an excuse to control the Internet.

Sadly even a tin foil hat won't protect me now:

http://people.csail.mit.edu/rahimi/helmet/

Abstract

Among a fringe community of paranoids, aluminum helmets serve as the protective measure of choice against invasive radio signals. We investigate the efficacy of three aluminum helmet designs on a sample group of four individuals. Using a $250,000 network analyser, we find that although on average all helmets attenuate invasive radio frequencies in either directions (either emanating from an outside source, or emanating from the cranium of the subject), certain frequencies are in fact greatly amplified. These amplified frequencies coincide with radio bands reserved for government use according to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC). Statistical evidence suggests the use of helmets may in fact enhance the government's invasive abilities. We speculate that the government may in fact have started the helmet craze for this reason.

Introduction

It has long been suspected that the government has been using satellites to read and control the minds of certain citizens. The use of aluminum helmets has been a common guerrilla tactic against the government's invasive tactics [1]. Surprisingly, these helmets can in fact help the government spy on citizens by amplifying certain key frequency ranges reserved for government use. In addition, none of the three helmets we analyzed provided significant attenuation to most frequency bands.
We describe our experimental setup, report our results, and conclude with a few design guidelines for constructing more effective helmets.

 

[blackheart]

I never saw any advertisement. Not even while googling "child porn"

Watch out, the FBI is coming for you now.

 

[IglooDame]

Great, the Democrats are already getting stupid. By election timethey will have become so arrogant, and think they can win by hating Bush alone, that they will have exposed themselves as teh left wing control freaks they are.

This lawsuit is ludicrous. NAMBLA does not have pictures of boys and men in sexual acts, so it is not child pronography. Child porn is only illegal because illegal acts are committed while creating it. Therefore, if an old man writes a long erotic stroy about molesting a 10 year old boy, it is legal, no matter how distasteful the American public at large finds it.

If it is considered obscene, it isn't protected. And who determines whether something is obscene? A jury. Article for you here and they're not even talking about child molestation, but about consensual sexual activities.

 

[Neomega]

If it is considered obscene, it isn't protected. And who determines whether something is obscene? A jury. Article for you here and they're not even talking about child molestation, but about consensual sexual activities.

note in paragraph 2... the word behavior. You can write a story about anything you want. It can be as obscene and as distasteful as you want. That is protected under the first amendment. What is not protected is when you are photographing events that may be construed as obscene, because you are breaking the law by having your subjects commit illegal acts for the camera.

 

[IglooDame]

note in paragraph 2... the word behavior. You can write a story about anything you want. It can be as obscene and as distasteful as you want. That is protected under the first amendment. What is not protected is when you are photographing events that may be construed as obscene, because you are breaking the law by having your subjects commit illegal acts for the camera.

Paras 4 & 5 from the article (bolding mine):

Though adult content is, in theory, protected by the First Amendment, only a jury can determine if a work is obscene or not under the subjective set of standards that vary from one community to the next established in the 1973 Supreme Court ruling, Miller v. California.

Text is not inherently more protected than images when it comes to obscenity charges. The erotic fiction website Red Rose Stories is facing obscenity charges after federal agents raided the owner's home on October 3rd, taking computer equipment and diskettes that contained all of their files and site information.