Legislation considered to make filtering online child pornography mandatory

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Minister of Communications Suvi Lindén would like to force Internet service providers to implement a secret police list of websites connected with child pornography to be filtered, if the providers do not do so voluntarily.
      The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) was authorised in 2006 to draw up filter lists of sites containing child pornography, or links to other pages that have it. These lists are given to Internet operators to enable them to block access to the offending sites. However, acting on the lists was not made mandatory.
      Lindén notes that when the go-ahead for the lists was given in 2006, the operators supported the move, but that now there are differing practices.
      "If a page has links to pages containing child pornography, I see no reason why such pages could not be filtered out", Lindén says.
     
Lindén sharply denounces those who debate the child pornography issue as a test of the limits of freedom of expression. She emphasises that she is primarily referring to the website of Matti Nikki, rather than the controversy over the art exhibit of Ulla Karttunen.
      "If we think that a book store has child pornography, or material suggesting it, police would go and take it away. This is the same procedure that should take place in the electronic environment."
     
Lindén has set up a working group to consider how children and young people could be protected from harmful content on the Internet and the electronic media.
      The 35-member media forum has representatives from groups including child protection organisations and the electronic media. The group is proposing actions for the promotion of responsible use of the Internet and the media at large.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Artwork critical of child pornography still under preliminary investigation (19.2.2008)
  Anti-Internet censorship website placed on police filter list over links to child porn sites (14.2.2008)

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