How Indirect Web Links Could Get You Investigated -- or Worse

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

________________________________________
From: Lauren Weinstein [lauren () vortex com]
Sent: Friday, January 25, 2008 12:01 AM
To: David Farber
Cc: lauren () vortex com
Subject: How Indirect Web Links Could Get You Investigated -- or Worse

        How Indirect Web Links Could Get You Investigated -- or Worse

                 http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000362.html


Greetings.  Just to prove yet again that witch hunts in the U.S.
aren't restricted to 1692 Salem, we have the sophomoric story of a
Florida Middle School resource officer under police and state
attorney general investigation because "friends" linked from his
MySpace page had themselves linked to pornographic sites.  The
details are illuminating, and more than a little distressing for
anyone who cares about free speech
( http://www.sptimes.com/2008/01/24/Pasco/Links_leave_cop_red_f.shtml ).

And golly, it looks like the school involved has its own indirect
link contents problems, too.  Gulf Middle School's "Resources"
page links to a variety of clip art sites, and they link to ...
well ...  let's just say that the entire Internet opens up at that
stage ( http://gmsbearsden.pasco.k12.fl.us/Information/Resources.html ).

I'm curious as to why the authorities in Florida are so quick to
investigate a school employee for indirect link contents, while
obviously the school itself -- which has a "We can accept no
responsibility for content on any pages linked" notice on their
resources page -- presumably feels that it should be immune to such
investigations related to their own official Web site.

If authorities start applying "safe for children" standards to
everyone whose Web page links to other pages that themselves at some
point and in some fashion link to "inappropriate" material, the
entire Internet will be on the chopping block in a "degrees of
separation" accusation orgy.

--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
lauren () vortex com or lauren () pfir org
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
http://www.pfir.org/lauren
Co-Founder, PFIR
   - People For Internet Responsibility - http://www.pfir.org
Co-Founder, NNSquad
   - Network Neutrality Squad - http://www.nnsquad.org
Founder, PRIVACY Forum - http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com



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