Child pornography refers to a visual record of child sexual abuse. Child pornography is a multi-billion dollar industry and one of the fastest growing criminal segments on the Internet.
Several organizations all over the world want internet providers to block the spread of child porn. The organizations do not want the internet providers to take over tasks of the police, but they argue that the providers are morally obliged to help the police and the judiciary in their battle against child porn.
Some internet providers have already taken measures to block child pornography, but many other providers turn down the responsibility for what their clients spread over their channels. These internet providers call blocking child porn ‘censorship’. They argue that it is against the freedom of speech. They do not consider the fight of child porn as their task. They say that by filtering you only raise up a curtain and you cannot see what happens at the neighbors anymore. It would not stop the production of child porn.
In my opinion the internet provider are indeed morally obliged to do what they can in the fight against child pornography. First of all, child pornography is not protected under any free-speech guarantees. Moreover, it is not about restricting freedom, but about protecting the dignity of children. Second, it is illegal and hideous. Real children are victimized, first by the production of the material and later each time a photograph or movie is viewed. Third, filtering porn is better than doing nothing. Each time a video or photograph of a raped child enters a living room, you risk the spread of it. The curtain prevents exposure; that is why it pays off.
http://www.euronews.net/2009/04/17/german-internet-providers-say-stop-to-child-porn/
s708724
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5 comments:
First of all having child pornography (on your computer) is against the law, against legality and therefore morally wrong. Therefore the internet providers have a moral duty to uphold legality and foreclose the distribution of child pornography.
Secondly if internet providers do not help to prevent the spreading of child pornography it goes against 'what we owe others'.
If internet providers argue the principles of helping police identifying people who distribute and make this porn, and preventing the abuse of children there is a problem in their point of view to tackle this problem. They have a ‘unenforceable duty’ to help. Therefore the argument of freedom of speech is a problem in moral motivation.
Furthermore to see the problem from point of view of consequentiality and deontological theories both the consequences and actions itself of not preventing the distribution of child pornography are morally wrong.
Therefore I fully agree with s708724 that providers should help preventing the distribution of child porn.
In my opinion this case does not resemble a moral hard case. At first site there is no reason for distributing child porn at all, even if the internet providers argue that it would be against freedom of speech. In a second thought, using the theory and after s374427’s ethical arguments, it becomes even worse and the issue can be seen as illegal. So what is hard in this case?
What I think is hard in this case, is how (practically) can internet providers respond to this kind of information sharing? Can this digital information be captured and is the source of this crime hereby caught? They can perhaps exclude parts of child porn industries, but they cannot punish or condemn. This is usually governmental regulated and is already done. So let the police do their job and let internet be a free information sharing society.
s938134
I agree with s938134. Its quite a straightforward case. Hosting illegal material is well...illegal. Warez sites are illegal, sites that host libellous material are required to remove it. Sites that illegally invade privacy are required to remove any private material. Child-pornography is definitely illegal. There's no argument to support hosting and distributing it.
I Agree that we have to do something against child porn, but the most important thing is protecting the innocent, so not only the abused children. The internet provider makes a list with specific files. That’s a good step in the right direction! But the new tool that the provider makes, includes files that is not only porn, it’s a file with some data. But what happens when the internet provider gives a warning or even in the end banned someone who is innocent? The system is flawed in its conception and is open to abuse. Allowing this to be passed puts us one step closer to a police state. When we've scarified our freedom for security, you can bet a lot more children are going to be hurt and exploited than they are now. It may start with child porn, but with the tools in place who can say when they start censoring other information. What will you do when they decide to censor the news, or things they consider?
s550209
I Agree that we have to do something against child porn, but the most important thing is protecting the innocent, so not only the abused children. The internet provider makes a list with specific files. That’s a good step in the right direction! But the new tool that the provider makes, includes files that is not only porn, it’s a file with some data. But what happens when the internet provider gives a warning or even in the end banned someone who is innocent? The system is flawed in its conception and is open to abuse. Allowing this to be passed puts us one step closer to a police state. When we've scarified our freedom for security, you can bet a lot more children are going to be hurt and exploited than they are now. It may start with child porn, but with the tools in place who can say when they start censoring other information like news.
s550209
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